Indianapolis Man Pleads Guilty and is Sentenced in Child Pornography Case

WASHINGTON—Roger Lowe, 50, of Indianapolis, was sentenced today to five years in prison for receiving child pornography, Assistant Attorney General of the Criminal Division Lanny A. Breuer and U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Indiana Timothy Morrison announced.

Lowe pleaded guilty on May 8, 2009, in federal court in Indianapolis to one count of receipt of child pornography. In entering that plea, Lowe admitted that he downloaded images of children engaged in various sexual acts and participated in an e-mail group where he received videos of child pornography.

This case arose from “Operation Brick Wall,” an FBI investigation that began in 2006. The investigation focused on a foreign producer of child pornography who provided videos depicting the sexual abuse of children to an e-mail group. Investigators targeted Lowe, who used an online service to download the videos from the e-mail group. A search warrant was executed at his residence and a forensic examination of the hard drive seized there revealed more than 7,000 images of child pornography, including those downloaded from the intercepted e-mail group.

The 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 is being prosecuted jointly by Assistant U.S. Attorney Steven DeBrota for the Southern District of Indiana and Trial Attorney LisaMarie Freitas of CEOS. The international investigation was conducted by the FBI’s Innocent Image Unit at Calverton, Md., and the case was investigated by the FBI’s Indianapolis Field Office.