South Sioux City Man Sentenced to 360 Months for Receipt and Distribution of Child Pornography

United States Attorney Susan T. Lehr announced that Clifford J. Halverson, age 57, of South Sioux City, Nebraska, was sentenced on September 11, 2024, in federal court in Omaha, Nebraska for receipt and distribution of child pornography. United States District Judge Brian C. Buescher sentenced Halverson to 360 months’ imprisonment. There is no parole in the federal system. After his release from prison, Halverson will be placed on a lifetime term of supervised release.

Halverson committed felony sex crimes involving children in North and South Dakota in the 1990s and was sentenced to 25 years in prison for these crimes. He was released from prison in 2018 at age 51.

In 2023, Halverson began to groom a 14-year-old girl online. The victim was forensically interviewed and reported the interactions. Halverson solicited from and exchanged with the victim sexually explicit photos and videos. The offense conduct began in late July of last year, and within a month the Halverson and the victim exchanged approximately 9,000 messages. Halverson was also in contact with another subject of the investigation, with whom he shared photographs of the victim and offered to set them up for intercourse. During the sentencing hearing, United States District Judge Buescher stated that the 360-month sentence was justified due to the “very disturbing nature of the offense” and Halverson’s criminal history.

This case was brought as part of Project Safe Childhood, a nationwide initiative to combat the growing epidemic of child sexual exploitation and abuse launched in May 2006 by the Department of Justice. Led by United States Attorney’s Offices and the Criminal Division's Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section (CEOS), Project Safe Childhood marshals federal, state and local resources to better locate, apprehend and prosecute individuals who exploit children via the Internet, as well as to identify and rescue victims. For more information about Project Safe Childhood, please visit www.projectsafechildhood.gov.

This case was investigated by the South Sioux City Police Department and the Omaha Federal Bureau of Investigation.