Baltimore Attorney Pleads Guilty to Possession of Child Pornography

BALTIMORE—Patrick Joseph Redd, age 32, of Baltimore, Maryland, an attorney, pleaded guilty today to possession of child pornography.

The guilty plea was announced by United States Attorney for the District of Maryland Rod J. Rosenstein; Special Agent in Charge Richard A. McFeely of the Federal Bureau of Investigation; and Colonel Terrence Sheridan, Superintendent of the Maryland State Police.

According to the plea agreement, the FBI searched Redd’s residence in Baltimore and seized his computer. A subsequent forensic examination of the computer recovered 11 images documenting the sexual abuse of children, including images depicting children younger than 12 years old. Redd used commonly used search terms to locate and download child pornography from the Internet.

As part of his plea agreement, Redd must register as a sex offender in the place where he resides, where he is an employee, and where he is a student, under the Sex Offender Registration and Notification Act (SORNA).

As part of the plea agreement, Redd and the government have agreed that if the court accepts the plea agreement, Redd will be sentenced to between 24 and 37 months in prison followed by supervised release for life. U.S. District Judge Richard D. Bennett has scheduled sentencing for September 20, 2011 at 3:00 p.m.

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 Attorneys’ 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. Details about Maryland’s program are available at www.justice.gov/usao/md/Safe-Childhood/index.html.

United States Attorney Rod J. Rosenstein commended the FBI and the Maryland State Police for their work in the investigation. Mr. Rosenstein thanked Assistant U.S. Attorneys Paul E. Budlow and Bonnie S. Greenberg, who are prosecuting the case.