Mountain Top Man Sentenced To 60 Months In Prison For Child Pornography Charge

SCRANTON - The United States Attorney’s Office for the Middle District of Pennsylvania announced that Joshua Ryan Lazar, age 37, of Mountain Top, Pennsylvania, was sentenced on January 19, 2023, to 60 months’ imprisonment by United States District Court Judge Malachy E. Mannion for receipt and distribution of child pornography.

According to United States Attorney Gerard M. Karam, on January 25, 2022, Lazar was indicted on one count of receiving and distributing visual depictions of minors engaged in sexually explicit conduct between September 2021 and November 30, 2021.  During the execution of a search warrant at Lazar’s residence agents seized his computer which contained over 1,560 images and 32 videos of child pornography.  The images included prepubescent minors and infants.  

At the time of sentencing, Judge Mannion ordered Lazar to pay $27,000 to victims for restitution. 

The case was investigated by Homeland Security Investigations.  Assistant U.S. Attorney Jenny Roberts prosecuted the case.

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.usdoj.gov/psc.

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