Lackawanna Man Sentenced in Child Pornography Case

BUFFALO, NY—Daniel Ronald Kowalski, 66, of Lackawanna, New York, who was convicted of possession of child pornography on May 13, 2009, was sentenced to 135 months in prison and lifetime supervised release by U.S. District Judge William M. Skretny, U.S. Attorney Kathleen M. Mehltretter of the Western District of New York announced today.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Aaron J. Mango, who handled the case, stated that the defendant had been convicted of possessing child pornography when he possessed 1,422 images of child pornography on a home-built generic computer. The defendant received and traded these images of child pornography over the internet using his AOL e-mail account.

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 United States 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 conviction was the culmination of an investigation on the part of Special Agents of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, under the direction of Special Agent in Charge James H. Robertson.