Defendant Indicted for Attempting to Buy a Child, Others Go to Federal Prison in Child-Related Cases

ATLANTA—United States Attorney Sally Quillian Yates announced a series of federal cases related to children and sexual exploitation, including an indictment returned today by a federal grand jury against a defendant who attempted to “buy” a child.

United States Attorney Sally Quillian Yates said, “These cases illustrate the various ways that criminals attempt to exploit children. Whether it is distribution of child pornography or attempting to buy a child, this horrific exploitation must be quickly uncovered and eliminated. Our federal law enforcement partners are dedicated to using every tool we can to find these criminals and hold them accountable.”

Brian D. Lamkin, Special Agent in Charge, FBI Atlanta Field Office, said, “The FBI continues to commit significant investigative resources toward these types of cases where the child is the victim or the intended victim. The FBI is proud of the role it has played in bringing these matters to justice and in providing a safer community for all.”

“ICE HSI will aggressively use its broad investigative authorities to identify and arrest individuals who seek to sexually exploit any child,” said Brock Nicholson, Special Agent in Charge of ICE-Homeland Security Investigations in Atlanta. “HSI is fully committed to insuring that those who victimize children are brought to justice.” Nicholson oversees HSI for the states of Georgia, North and South Carolina.

United States Marshal Beverly Harvard said, “The Marshals Service is not limited by location jurisdictional boundaries and will continue to check on convicted sex offenders to ensure that they are in compliance with the conditions of their release. It does not matter if the offender moves from one state to another we will not give up on our efforts to track down those believed not to be in compliance with release as well as those believed to be sexually exploiting children.”

• CARL SKOW, 34, of Marietta, Georgia, was indicted today for attempting to obtain a minor for the purpose of engaging in a commercial sex act, enticement of a minor to engage in sexual activity, and possession of child pornography. SKOW previously had an initial appearance on a criminal complaint before Judge Linda T. Walker and is currently in custody pending trial. In June 2011, an undercover federal agent responded to an ad posted by SKOW on an online classifieds website in which he offered a younger girl sex for money.

Between early June 2011 and July 6, 2011, SKOW and the agent communicated several times through electronic mail, by telephone, and in person, regarding SKOW’s interest in purchasing a minor female from Guatemala for sexual services. SKOW agreed to pay the agent $2,500 for a year of her services and made a down payment of $1,250 for the minor. The agent and SKOW agreed to meet at Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport on July 6, 2011, where SKOW planned to pick up the minor female, and make the final $1,250 payment to the undercover agent. On that day at the agreed meeting location, SKOW was arrested in possession of the final payment. Also on July 6, agents executed a search warrant at SKOW’s home and found, among other items, numerous images of child pornography on SKOW’s home computer. The SKOW case is being investigated by U.S. Customs and Immigration-HSI.

• EDGAR PAGAN-TORRES, 43, of Peachtree City, Georgia, until recently a lieutenant colonel with the U.S. Army, was sentenced yesterday to 30 years in prison and a lifetime of supervised release for using his young daughter, niece, and one of their friends to produce homemade pornographic videos. PAGAN was assigned to Army Fort Buchanan in Puerto Rico from 2004 to 2007. At that time, he, his wife, and his daughter lived near PAGAN’s sister, who has a daughter the same age as PAGAN’s daughter. The two girls frequently played together, along with a third girl from the neighborhood—typically under PAGAN’s supervision. The girls were all under 10. In late 2008, a year after PAGAN and his family relocated to Peachtree City, PAGAN’s niece made an outcry alleging that PAGAN had molested her and his daughter. In 2009, family members passed this information to law enforcement in Puerto Rico, resulting in PAGAN’s guilty plea in Puerto Rico in early 2010 to criminal charges related to his niece’s molestation allegations.
  
  At the same time the Puerto Rican authorities were investigating PAGAN’s molestation of his niece, agents from the U.S. Army’s Criminal Investigations Division based at Ft. McPherson seized various computers and digital media from PAGAN’s home in Peachtree City. Searches of these items revealed sexually explicit videos PAGAN had made involving his daughter, his niece, and the third girl. Some of the videos were made in PAGAN’s home in Puerto Rico and others were made in his Peachtree City residence. Many of the videos had been transferred from the original digital recording media to home video-style DVDs, carefully organized into chapters. Additional computer forensic work uncovered a large collection of child pornography PAGAN had downloaded from the Internet. The PAGAN case was investigated by the FBI, the United States Army’s Criminal Investigations Division, and the Peachtree City Police Department.
  
  
• CARL MARVIN RANDLE, 53, of Atlanta, was sentenced yesterday to one year and six months in prison for having failed to register as a sex offender upon moving to Atlanta from Buffalo, New York. In 1995, RANDLE was convicted of raping a young girl in Buffalo. Upon release from New York state prison, and as a condition of his criminal sentence, RANDLE was required to register as a sex offender for the remainder of his natural life, whether he remained in New York or not.
  
  In late 2007, after serving several more years in prison on a parole revocation, RANDLE moved from New York to Atlanta. RANDLE failed to alert local authorities in New York to his move, nor did he, at any time after his arrival in Atlanta, register with any metro-area sheriff’s offices. Upon discovering RANDLE’s failure to renew his registration in Buffalo, local authorities in that jurisdiction took out a warrant for RANDLE’s arrest. The U.S. Marshals Service ultimately tracked down RANDLE here in Fulton County in December 2010. The RANDLE case was investigated by the United States Marshals Service.

These cases are being prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorneys Jill Steinberg and Robert McBurney.

For further information please contact Sally Q. Yates, United States Attorney, or Charysse L. Alexander, Executive Assistant United States Attorney, through Patrick Crosby, Public Affairs Officer, U.S. Attorney’s Office, at (404) 581-6016. The Internet address for the HomePage for the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of Georgia is www.justice.gov/usao/gan.