St. Petersburg Man Sentenced to 10 Years for Transportation of Child Pornography

TAMPA, FL—U.S. District Judge Elizabeth A. Kovachevich sentenced Daniel E. Lombardi (30, St. Petersburg) yesterday to 10 years in federal prison for transportation of child pornography. The court also ordered Lombardi to forfeit a laptop computer and two hard drives, which he used to facilitate the commission of the offense. Lombardi pled guilty on May 8, 2012.

According to court documents, on November 9, 2011, an FBI agent working in an undercover capacity launched a publicly available file-sharing program. The agent observed that an individual, later identified as Lombardi, was logged into the file-sharing network and was sharing a folder that contained numerous images of child pornography. The agent downloaded several of the images. During subsequent sessions conducted by undercover law enforcement officers, Lombardi shared images of child pornography and chatted about possibly traveling to have sex with a child.

On January 25, 2012, a federal search warrant was executed at Lombardi’s St. Petersburg residence. That same day, Lombardi confessed to possessing and sending child pornography over the Internet. Subsequent forensic reviews of the computer and hard drives seized from Lombardi’s residence revealed 2,696 images of child pornography and 115 video files of child pornography.

This case was investigated by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s Homeland Security Investigations, and the St. Petersburg Police Department. It was prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorney Joseph W. Swanson.

It is another case that was brought as part of Project Safe Childhood, a nationwide initiative launched in May 2006 by the Department of Justice to combat the growing epidemic of child sexual exploitation and abuse. Led by the United States Attorneys’ Offices and the Criminal Division’s Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section, Project Safe Childhood marshals federal, state, and local resources to locate, apprehend, and prosecute individuals who sexually exploit children, and to identify and rescue victims. For more information about Project Safe Childhood, please visit www.usdoj.gov/psc. For more information about Internet safety education, please visit www.usdoj.gov/psc and click on the tab “resources.”