Production of Child Pornography Results in More Than 27 Years in Prison for 23-Year-Old Austin Man

CORPUS CHRISTI, TX—A 23-year-old Austin man convicted of producing child pornography has been sentenced to more than 27 years in federal prison without parole, United States Attorney José Angel Moreno announced today.

Timothy Cyrus Flores, 23, of Austin, Texas, was sentenced late Wednesday, Jan. 19, 2011, by Senior United States District Judge John D. Rainey to 327 months in federal prison to be followed by a lifetime term of supervised release. Judge Rainey ordered Flores to register as a sex offender and for the duration of his term of supervised release must comply with any number of standard and special conditions designed to protect children and limit Flores’ access to the Internet.

Indicted in July 2010, Flores was convicted of producing child pornography after pleading guilty to the federal felony offense in October 2010. At the time of his re-arraignment, Flores admitted to filming and photographing his sexual assaults of a young child contained in the photos and videos discovered by the FBI at his residence among other images of child pornography. Flores further admitted to having committed the assaults on the child while residing in Corpus Christi, Texas.

An investigation into the sending and receiving of child pornography brought Flores to the attention of law enforcement after a cell phone number utilized by Flores was found to have sent child pornography to another individual who was under investigation for possession of child pornography. In February 2009, agents with the Austin office of the FBI conducted a search of the cell phone and computers possessed by Flores at his Austin apartment. A forensic analysis of these devices led to the discovery of numerous images and videos of child pornography, many of which had been previously identified by the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children as known child victims. After the analysis was received by the investigating agent, he recognized a distinctive article of clothing found in some of the child pornography images as clothing seen in Flores’ apartment at the time of the search. In June 2010, FBI agents confronted Flores with their discovery leading to his admitting the assaults on the child. Agents identified the child and confirmed the sexual assaults had indeed occurred.

In handing down the sentence yesterday, Judge John Rainey noted the need to protect the public from Flores as well as the need to deter others from engaging in other similar conduct.

In custody without bond since his June 2010 arrest, Flores will remain in custody pending his transfer to Bureau of Prisons facility to be designated in the near future where he will serve his sentence.

The charges and conviction are the result of the investigation conducted by the Austin and Corpus Christi offices of the FBI. This case, prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Lance Duke, 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, 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.