Man Sentenced to 20 Years for Production and Possession of Child Pornography

BUFFALO, NY—U.S. Attorney William J. Hochul, Jr. announced today that Paul Hackett, 45, of Buffalo, New York, who was convicted of production of child pornography and possession of child pornography, was sentenced to 20 years in prison and lifetime supervised release by U.S. District Chief Judge William M. Skretny.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Aaron J. Mango, who handled the case, stated between October 1998 and August 2001, the defendant knowingly enticed and coerced a minor female victim to engage in sexually explicit conduct for the purpose of producing visual depictions of such conduct. Specifically, while Hackett was using the victim to engage in sexually explicit conduct, he took approximately 16 Polaroid photographs of the victim. Those pictures were subsequently found in the defendant’s residence in October 2011 and depict the victim engaging in sexually explicit conduct. During the relevant time period, the victim ranged in age from 15 to 17 years old.

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.

The sentencing is the culmination of an investigation on the part of special agents of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, under the direction of Special Agent in Charge Christopher M. Piehota; and detectives with the Buffalo Police Department, under the direction of Commissioner Daniel Derenda.