Rochester Man Pleads Guilty to Distributing and Receiving Child Pornography

ROCHESTER, NY—U.S. Attorney William J. Hochul, Jr. announced today that Richard Bailey, 54, of Rochester, New York, pleaded guilty to distributing and receiving child pornography before U.S. District Judge Charles J. Siragusa. The charge carries a mandatory minimum penalty of five year in prison, a maximum of 20 years, a $250,000 fine, or both.

Assistant U.S. Attorney John J. Field, who is handling the case, stated that Bailey used a computer and peer-to-peer software to obtain and distribute images of child pornography which included violence against children. Some of the images involved prepubescent minors.

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.justice.gov/psc.

The plea is the culmination of an investigation on the part of special agents of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, under the direction of Acting Special Agent in Charge Richard M. Frankel.

Sentencing is scheduled for October 11, 2013, at 3:30 p.m. before Judge Siragusa.