Albuquerque Man Sentenced to 97 Months in Prison for Federal Child Pornography Conviction

ALBUQUERQUE—This afternoon, a federal judge sentenced Robert W. Schmidt, 56, of Albuquerque, to a 97-month term of imprisonment for his conviction for transporting child pornography. Schmidt will be on supervised release for 10 years after he completes his prison sentence. He also will be required to register as a sex offender.

U.S. Attorney Kenneth J. Gonzales said that Schmidt entered a guilty plea on November 14, 2011, to count one of a four-count superseding indictment charging him with two counts of transportation of child pornography and two counts of possession of child pornography. As required by his plea agreement, counts two, three, and four of the superseding indictment were dismissed after Schmidt was sentenced.

Schmidt was arrested on April 5, 2011, as a result of an investigation by the Albuquerque Police Department, the FBI, and the New Mexico Regional Forensic Computer Lab, which was initiated after a maintenance employee at the apartment complex where Schmidt was a tenant reported seeing child pornography on a computer in Schmidt’s apartment. The maintenance man observed the child pornography after entering the apartment to facilitate an emergency repair. Based on the maintenance man’s report, the Albuquerque Police Department executed a search warrant at Schmidt’s apartment and seized computers and computer-related media, which contained thousands of child pornography images and videos.

In his plea agreement, Schmidt acknowledged that the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children has determined that the child pornography images found on his computers and computer-related media included 1244 images of 48 children who have been identified as child pornography victims and have been rescued. Schmidt also admitted bringing child pornography from Illinois to New Mexico, when he moved from Rockford, Illinois, to Albuquerque in June 2010.

The case was prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Charlyn E. Rees and was brought as part of Project Safe Childhood, a nationwide initiative launched in May 2006 by the Department of Justice (DOJ) to combat the growing epidemic of child sexual exploitation and abuse. Led by United States Attorneys’ Offices and DOJ’s 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 exploit children via the Internet, as well as to identify and rescue victims. For more information about Project Safe Childhood, please visit www.justice.gov/psc/.

The case also was brought as part of the New Mexico Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force’s mission to locate, track, and capture Internet child sexual predators and Internet child pornographers in New Mexico. There are 64 federal, state, and local law enforcement agencies associated with the ICAC Task Force, which is funded by a grant administered by the NMAGO. Anyone with information relating to suspected child predators and suspected child abuse is encouraged to contact federal or local law enforcement.