Boise man pleads guilty to receiving child pornography

BOISE, Idaho – A Boise man pleaded guilty Tuesday to federal child exploitation charges, following a probe by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s (ICE) Homeland Security Investigations (HSI).

Travis L. Spradlin, 37, first caught the attention of HSI special agents in September 2015 when a Yahoo account linked to his residence was used to send and receive child pornography. Agents also determined an individual in the same Boise residence had accessed a Russian photo-sharing website to obtain child pornography.

During a federal search warrant, HSI special agents seized a cell phone, computer and external hard drive all belonging to Spradlin. A certified HSI forensic examiner found more than 6,000 images and 200 videos containing child pornography on the seized electronic devices. Investigators also discovered additional evidence that Spradlin had communicated with at least two minor females from other states requesting sexually explicit images from them. In all, Spradlin received 274 images and 29 videos from one of the minors engaged in explicit conduct.

Subsequent to HSI’s investigation, the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC) identified 1,759 images and 70 videos containing identifiable victims of sexual abuse including victims from at least 150 known series of child pornography. The images included prepubescent minors depicting sadistic and masochistic conduct.                                                                                                              

Spradlin’s sentencing is set for April 13 before visiting U.S. District Judge Dee V. Benson from the District of Utah.

The charges in this case are a product of Project Safe Childhood, a Department of Justice initiative launched in 2006 to combat the growing epidemic of child sexual exploitation and abuse, and HSI’s Operation Predator, an international initiative to protect children from sexual predators.

Led by the U.S. Attorneys’ Offices and the Criminal Division’s Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section, Project Safe Childhood marshals federal, state, and local resources to locate, apprehend, and prosecute those who sexually exploit children, and to identify and rescue victims.

Since the launch of Operation Predator in 2003, HSI has arrested more than 14,000 individuals for crimes against children, including the production and distribution of online child pornography, traveling overseas for sex with minors, and sex trafficking of children. In fiscal year 2015, nearly 2,400 individuals were arrested by HSI special agents under this initiative and more than 1,000 victims identified or rescued.

For additional information about wanted suspected child predators, download HSI’s Operation Predator smartphone app or visit the online suspect alerts page.