Ohio Man Sentenced to 15 Years in Prison on Child Pornography Charges and Violation of the Adam Walsh Act

WASHINGTON—Timothy L. Lantz was sentenced today to 15 years in prison for transporting child pornography in interstate commerce and failing to update his sex offender registration in violation of the Adam Walsh Act, announced Assistant Attorney General of the Criminal Division Lanny A. Breuer, Acting U. S. Attorney for the Southern District of Ohio William E. Hunt, U.S. Marshal for the Southern District of Ohio Jim Wahlrab, and FBI Special Agent in Charge for the Cincinnati region Keith L. Bennett.

Lantz, 57, was also sentenced by U.S. District Judge George C. Smith in Columbus, Ohio, to lifetime supervised release following his prison term, and was ordered to pay a $10,000 fine. Lantz pleaded guilty to the charges on May 4, 2009.

According to his plea agreement, Lantz, a convicted sex offender, fled the Columbus area in January 2007, days after members of the FBI Cybercrime Task Force searched his West Columbus apartment and seized multiple computers, hard drives and other media. Forensic analysis uncovered more than 9,000 images and 1,200 videos of child pornography on the computers and storage media.

An international search for Lantz ended in the Philippines in June 2008, when Philippine Immigration and Philippine National Police authorities arrested him without incident in the remote Kolambugan, Lanao Del Norte region. Philippine authorities turned Lantz over to the U.S. Department of State’s Diplomatic Security Service in Manila, and Deputy U.S. Marshals returned him to the United States, where he has since been in custody.

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 U.S. 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 case was prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Deborah Solove of the Southern District of Ohio and CEOS Trial Attorney Mi Yung C. Park. The case was investigated by the U.S. Marshals Service, the FBI Columbus Cybercrime Task Force, the State Department’s Diplomatic Security Service and U.S. Embassy staff in Manila, as well as CEOS’ High Technology Investigative Unit.