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Press Release

Lehigh Acres Man Sentenced To 29 Years In Federal Prison For Using A Child To Produce Images Depicting Sexual Abuse

For Immediate Release
U.S. Attorney's Office, Middle District of Florida

Fort Myers, Florida – U.S. District Judge Thomas P. Barber has sentenced John Michael Breen (33, Lehigh Acres) to 29 years in federal prison for sexually abusing a child and taking photos of this abuse. Breen was also sentenced to a lifetime of supervised release and ordered to register as a sex offender.

Breen had pleaded guilty on August 19, 2020.

According to court documents, between April 28 and July 20, 2018, Breen used a child to engage in sexually explicit conduct for the purpose of producing images of this abuse. Breen subsequently uploaded these photos over the internet to a cloud-based storage service. On December 13, 2019, law enforcement officers executed a search warrant at Breen’s residence. During an interview with law enforcement, Breen admitted that he had sexually abused a 7-year-old child at his home and took pictures of the abuse using his cellphone.

This case was investigated by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, Fort Myers Child Exploitation and Human Trafficking Task Force. It was prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorney Yolande G. Viacava.

This is another case 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 Attorney’s 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.justice.gov/psc.

Updated June 29, 2021

Topic
Project Safe Childhood