Carl Junction Man Sentenced to 25 Years in Prison for Internet Child Porn

SPRINGFIELD, Mo. – Tammy Dickinson, United States Attorney for the Western District of Missouri, announced that a Carl Junction, Mo., man was sentenced in federal court today for receiving child pornography over the Internet.

James Lee Hagerman, 51, of Carl Junction, was sentenced by U.S. District Judge Greg Kays to 25 years in federal prison without parole. The court also sentenced Hagerman to 20 years of supervised release following his prison term.

On Feb. 7, 2013, Hagerman pleaded guilty to two counts of receiving child pornography.

An officer with the Southwest Missouri Cybercrimes Task Force was conducting an online investigation into the sharing of child pornography on April 24, 2012, when he identified Hagerman’s computer as sharing over 100 files of child pornography through a peer-to-peer file-sharing program. The officer downloaded three of the files and determined that they contained depictions of children as young as two to four years of age engaged in sexually explicit conduct.

Law enforcement officers executed a search warrant at Hagerman’s apartment and seized his computer. Hagerman told officers that he had approximately 1,000 child pornography videos stored on his computer.

This case was prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney James J. Kelleher. It was investigated by the FBI and the Southwest Missouri Cybercrimes Task Force.

Project Safe Childhood

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 . For more information about Internet safety education, please visit www.usdoj.gov/psc and click on the tab "resources."