Woman Sentenced to 30 Years in Federal Prison for Producing Child Sexual Abuse Material Using Infant

SAN ANTONIO – A San Antonio woman was sentenced in a federal court in San Antonio today to 30 years in prison for production of child pornography.

According to court documents, Ashley Nicole Smith, 41, sexually assaulted a minor child on multiple occasions, from the time he was just days old in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) until he was 18 months old, beginning in November 2019 and continuing through March 2021. Smith produced videos of the sexual assaults on the child victim and distributed the files via text messages to her boyfriend.

Smith was arrested on March 4, 2021, and charged in a 10-count indictment on March 17, 2021. She pleaded guilty on Aug. 28, 2024. In addition to the 30-year imprisonment, U.S. District Judge Orlando Garcia ordered Smith to serve 30 years of supervised release and ordered that Smith never have contact with the victim. Smith was also ordered to pay $50,000 to the AVAA fund for victims of child exploitation trafficking offenses and to forfeit the devices used to produce the child exploitation material.

U.S. Attorney Justin R. Simmons for the Western District of Texas made the announcement.

The FBI and San Antonio Police Department investigated the case.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Tracy Thompson prosecuted the case.

This case was brought as part of Project Safe Childhood, a nationwide initiative to combat the epidemic of child sexual exploitation and abuse launched in May 2006 by the Department of Justice. Led by U.S. Attorneys’ Offices and 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, visit www.justice.gov/psc.

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