Pikesville Man Sentenced to Five Years in Federal Prison for Receiving and Possessing Child Pornography

Baltimore, Maryland – U.S. District Judge Marvin J. Garbis sentenced Jonathan J. Lewin, age 46, of Pikesville, Maryland, today to five years in federal prison, followed by 12 years years of supervised release, for receiving and possessing child pornography. Judge Garbis also ordered that upon his release from prison Lewin must register as a sex offender in the place where he resides, where he is an employee, and where he is a student, under the Sex Offender Registration and Notification Act (SORNA).

The sentence was announced by United States Attorney for the District of Maryland Rod J. Rosenstein; Special Agent in Charge Kevin Perkins of the Federal Bureau of Investigation; Special Agent in Charge Andre R. Watson of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s (ICE) Homeland Security Investigations (HSI); and Chief James W. Johnson of the Baltimore County Police Department.

According to information presented to the court at the plea hearing, Lewin admitted that prior to May 16, 2014, he received child pornography from a file sharing network and that on May 16, 2014, Lewin made child pornography publicly available to other users of a file sharing network using an internet account assigned to his residence.  On May 26, 2014, a law enforcement officer engaged in undercover internet investigations for offenders publicly sharing child pornography located a device used by Lewin, which was accessing the internet.  The undercover officer downloaded several files that Lewin was sharing over the internet which depicted sexually explicit images of nude prepubescent girls.

On June 12, 2014, law enforcement officers executed a search warrant at Lewin’s home and recovered numerous electronic devices, including an external hard drive, two thumb drives, a tablet computer, a custom built desk top computer, and several cloud accounts.  Forensic examination of the computer and other electronic devices revealed thousands of images of child pornography, including the images downloaded by the undercover officer.

Additionally, the forensic examination revealed that Lewin used his cell phone camera to take hundreds of voyeuristic images of young females in public places including the zoo, grocery stores, and parks. Many of these images included zoomed in images of prepubescent female children’s buttocks and appeared to be taken while Lewin was following the children around a park or store.  Lewin added sexually explicit text banners to some of these voyeur images. It is clear from the images that the subjects were unaware that they were being followed or photographed. These images were stored on Lewin’s computer and other devices and sorted into individual folders, often by location.

One recurring subject of Lewin’s voyeuristic photographs was a prepubescent female child, age 14, with whom Lewin was acquainted. Lewin had photographs of this girl that were extracted from her and her mother’s social media, without their knowledge and were cropped and zoomed so that she was the focus of the image. Lewin also had photographs of her taken from inside her home and photographs of her exiting a vehicle that Lewin was driving which focused on her backside and buttocks. Lewin saved the images of this child on his computer and other devices in a folder titled in her name. 

This case was brought as part of Project Safe Childhood, a nationwide initiative launched in May 2006 by the Department of Justice to combat the growing epidemic of child sexual exploitation and abuse. Led by the United States 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 individuals who sexually exploit children, and to identify and rescue victims. For more information about Project Safe Childhood, please visit www.justice.gov/psc.  For more information about internet safety education, please visit www.justice.gov/psc and click on the "resources" tab on the left of the page.              

United States Attorney Rod J. Rosenstein commended the FBI, HSI Baltimore and Baltimore County Police Department for their work in the investigation.  Mr. Rosenstein thanked Assistant U.S. Attorney Sandra K. Wilkinson and Special Assistant United States Attorney Lauren E. Perry, who prosecuted the case.