Texas man sentenced to nearly 7 years for possessing child pornography

BEAUMONT, Texas - A Sour Lake, Texas, man was sentenced on Friday to six years and eight months in prison for possessing child pornography, announced U.S. Attorney John M. Bales, Eastern District of Texas. The investigation was conducted by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement's (ICE) Homeland Security Investigations (HSI).

Robert Emmet Horn, 45, was sentenced to 80 months in federal prison on April 8 by U.S. District Judge Marcia Crone, after he pleaded guilty to possessing child pornography on Nov. 22. A federal grand jury returned an indictment on Oct. 29, 2010 charging Horn with child pornography violations.

According to court documents, on Feb. 12, 2010, law enforcement officers executed a federal search warrant at Horn's Sour Lake residence seizing a personal computer and two laptop computers. A forensic analysis of the computers by ICE-HSI revealed over a thousand images of child pornography. Some of these images depicted minors engaged in sexually explicit sadistic, masochistic, or violent acts with children under 12 years old.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Christopher T. Tortorice, Eastern District of Texas, prosecuted this case.

This investigation was part of Operation Predator, a nationwide ICE initiative to protect children from sexual predators, including those who travel overseas for sex with minors, Internet child pornographers, criminal alien sex offenders, and child sex traffickers.

ICE encourages the public to report suspected child predators and any suspicious activity through its toll-free hotline at 1-866-DHS-2ICE. This hotline is staffed around the clock by investigators.

Suspected child sexual exploitation or missing children may be reported to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, an Operation Predator partner, at 1-800-843-5678 or http://www.cybertipline.com.