News Releases and Statements

Nathaniel Tejeda, 30, of Reno, Nevada, appeared for his sentencing hearing in U.S. District Court Feb. 9. He was indicted in April 2016 for producing and distributing child pornography depicting infants and toddlers.

Erik Rodriguez, 25, pleaded guilty Aug. 24 and, according to court documents, admitted to possessing and producing child pornography.

Robert D. Thorson, 58, was arrested May 30 after his girlfriend contacted the Des Moines police alerting them to sexually explicit images of minors found on Thorson’s phone.

Alexander Greaux-Gomez, 39, was arrested at his place of residence in Salinas following an HSI investigation that revealed that he allegedly engaged in criminal sexual conduct with a 15-year-old female minor.

Andrew Craig Sustaita, 30, of Spring, Texas, was indicted by a federal grand jury Feb. 1 on charges of producing child pornography.

According to court documents, Bruce Lee Scott, 30, received numerous images of child pornography through an internet-based file sharing program. After conducting a search warrant on his residence, investigators found that Scott possessed more than 1,000 pictures and 46 videos of child pornography on his laptop. 

Paul Bradley Meagher, 43, of Grand Forks, North Dakota, was sentenced by U.S. District Judge Ralph R. Erickson to serve 10 years in prison.  Meagher had previously pleaded guilty plea to receiving and distributing child pornography via the internet.

Jebediah Dishman, 70, of Freedonia, Kansas, was arrested Nov. 8 in Houston and originally charged by criminal complaint.

Christopher David Johnston, 40, of Ferndale, first came to the attention of special agents with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s (ICE) Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) after posting an ad in the “casual encounters” section of Craigslist’s personal ad site. Phrases used in the ad led HSI special agents to believe Johnston was seeking sex with minors.

Miguel Jimenez Jr., from Freeport, Texas, came to the attention of authorities after they believed he was uploading and storing child pornography into a virtual storage account. A search warrant was executed at his residence, at which time law enforcement located and seized various computers and cellphones. Forensic analysis of the phones, computers and virtual storage accounts revealed 658 child pornography images and 634 child pornography videos. 

HSI special agents executed the arrest of Gabriel Maldonado-Hernandez, 19, of Parcelas Navas, Arecibo, without incident.

U.S. Marine Corps Maj. Jason Michael Ehret, 44, an active-duty officer serving as an aviation flight instructor, was sentenced to 87 months in federal prison by U.S. District Judge Janis Graham.  Ehret was further ordered to pay a $10,000 fine.  He must also serve the rest of his life on supervised release, during which time he will have to comply with numerous requirements designed to restrict his access to children and the internet.

On May 6, 2015, a federal grand jury returned an Indictment charging Brandon Tyler Hill, 31, of Colorado Springs, Colorado, and Rhiannon Carnahan, of Woodland Park, Colorado, with child pornography related charges.  Prior to the indictment, Hill and Carnahan were charged via Criminal Complaints.

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.

Steven Wayne Robinson, 40, of Daisetta, Texas, was sentenced Jan. 19 to 420 months in prison by U.S. District Judge Marcia Crone for two counts of producing child pornography. He pleaded guilty Sept. 1, 2016.

Jeremy Gregory, 36, befriended the victims’ father while serving as a youth baseball umpire and began taking the two boys, then 13 and 11 years old, to baseball games and amusement parks.

Paul Charles Wilkins, 70, of Littleport in East Cambridgeshire, England, a dual United States-United Kingdom citizen, was sentenced Wednesday morning by U.S. District Judge Dolly M. Gee.

Jose Diego Gonzales, 30, of Fort Worth, Texas, has been in custody since his arrest in July 2016 in Fort Worth.

Scott Mitchell Cohen, 52, of Seattle, was arrested Jan. 16 after being identified as the user of an email account that had received images of child pornography. According to court records, the investigation began when Google alerted the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC) about images of child sexual abuse that had been uploaded via a Google email account.

Pierre D. Hayes, 27, of Rockford, was charged Jan. 10 with three counts of transporting child pornography over the internet in 2015.

Adrian Jaimes, 22, of Nekoosa, Wisconsin, was sentenced Jan. 11 by U.S. District Judge James Peterson to 97 months (eight years and one month) in federal prison, to be followed by 20 years of supervised release.

John C. Vastis, 54, of Lakemoor, Illinois, began communicating online with one of his victims in 2013. From the outset, the chats were sexually charged. For nearly a year Vastis encouraged the victim to record sexually explicit photos and videos of himself and transmit the images over the internet to Vastis.

Theodore Allen Leleaux, 34, appeared for his sentencing hearing in U.S. District Court Friday.