Tyler County Man Sentenced for Child Pornography Violations

BEAUMONT, TX—A 51-year-old Colmesneil, Texas man has been sentenced to federal prison for child pornography violations in the Eastern District of Texas, announced U.S. Attorney John M. Bales today.

Jeffrey Fred Allen pleaded guilty on February 28, 2012, to distribution of child pornography and was sentenced to 240 months in federal prison today by U.S. District Judge Ron Clark.

According to information presented in court, on December 6, 2011, a Bureau of Prisons (BOP) corrections officer at a BOP facility in Kentucky intercepted a greeting card in the daily mail that contained four hidden photos of child pornography that had been printed from a computer onto plain copy paper. The greeting card was addressed to an inmate at the BOP and sent by U.S. mail from Allen. Federal agents executed a search warrant at Allen’s Colmesneil residence on December 21, 2011, during which they seized a personal computer. A forensic analysis of the computer revealed over 100 images and over 100 movie files, many of which contained images of prepubescent children under the age of 12 years engaged in sexually explicit conduct involving acts of bondage.

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.

This case was investigated by BOP and FBI and prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Reynaldo P. Morin.