FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE	CONTACT: Lauren Horwood
March 11, 2011	PHONE: (916) 554-2706
www.usdoj.gov/usao/cae	usacae.edcapress@usdoj.gov
Docket #: 1:08-cr-00058 OWW

FRESNO, Calif. — United States Attorney Benjamin B. Wagner announced that Jennifer Lynn Thurman, 35, of Porterville, was sentenced today to 120 years in prison for sexual exploitation of minors. Thurman also will be subject to a lifetime term of supervised release.

In imposing this sentence, Judge Oliver W. Wanger stated that these "offenses are indescribably horrible" and "strike at the core values of society."

This case was the result of an investigation by the Porterville Police Department with assistance from the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Tulare County District Attorney's Office. Assistant United States Attorney David Gappa prosecuted the case.

According to court documents, between September 2007 and January 2008, Jennifer Thurman and co-defendant Steven Arthur administered the tranquilizer Ativan to four minors who were staying at their house. They placed the drug in Oreo cookies or drinks and then gave it to the minors. Once the minors were unconscious, the defendants produced still and video images of each defendant engaged in sexually explicit conduct with the minors. Both defendants filmed each other engaging in sexually explicit conduct with the minors. At least one image depicted violence. Many of the images were then transferred to a computer or to compact disks.

Arthur was sentenced by Judge Wanger on December 13, 2010, to120 years in prison. Arthur and Thurman each still face multiple felony charges resulting from an indictment in the California Superior Court, Tulare County.

This case was brought as part of Project Safe Childhood (PSC), a nationwide initiative by the Department of Justice to combat the growing epidemic of child sexual exploitation and abuse. Led by United States Attorneys' Offices and the Criminal Division's Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section, PSC mobilizes federal, state, and local resources to locate, apprehend, and prosecute individuals who exploit children via the Internet, as well as to identify and rescue victims. For more information, visit www.projectsafechildhood.gov or call the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Eastern District of California and ask to speak with the PSC coordinator.

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