Tarrant County Man Sentenced To 180 Months In Federal Prison For Transporting And Shipping Child Pornography

DALLAS — Walter Eugene Rogers, 33, of Watauga, Texas, was sentenced this morning by U.S. District Judge David C. Godbey to 180 months in federal prison and a five-year term of supervised release, following his guilty plea in November 2012 to one count of transporting and shipping child pornography, announced U.S. Attorney Sarah R. Saldaña of the Northern District of Texas. Rogers has been in custody since he was arrested in Georgia by officers with the Tallapoosa Police Department on a related charge outlined in a criminal complaint.

According to documents filed in the case, a special agent with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s (ICE) Homeland Security Investigations (HSI), conducting an undercover investigation to identify persons involved in the distribution of child pornography through the use of peer-to-peer file sharing networks, identified a particular computer that was sharing images of child pornography. The undercover agent downloaded some of the more than 384 files available for sharing that had names indicative of child pornography, and found that they did contain images of child pornography.

Based on the downloaded images, a warrant was executed at Rogers’ home in Watauga in November 2011 and agents seized a computer and related storage devices, as well as a bag of printed child pornography images. Rogers admitted that he had been downloading child pornography since the mid-1990's and that he is attracted to boys 9-12 years of age. Rogers also admitted that he had images and videos of sex acts, bondage and other sadistic acts involving children, and that he had downloaded child pornography just a few hours before agents arrived that day.

The 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 U.S. Attorneys’ Offices and the Criminal Division's Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section, Project Safe Childhood marshals federal, state and local resources to better locate, apprehend and prosecute individuals who sexually exploit children, and to identify and rescue victims. For more information about Project Safe Childhood, please visit http://www.justice.gov/psc/ For more information about internet safety education, please visit http://www.justice.gov/psc/ and click on the tab “resources.”

ICE HSI investigated the case; Assistant U.S. Attorney Camille Sparks prosecuted.