JACKSONVILLE, FL—Senior United States District Judge Harvey E. Schlesinger has sentenced Shaun Andrew Copenhaver (29, Jacksonville) to 10 years in federal prison for knowingly receiving child pornography over the Internet. He was also ordered to serve a 15-year term of supervision following his incarceration, to register as a sex offender, and to forfeit his computer media. Copenhaver has been in custody since his arrest on February 6, 2014.

According to court documents, an agent with the Florida Department of Law Enforcement in Jacksonville began an undercover investigation to identify individuals in the area that had access to and/or were trading images and videos of child pornography over the Internet. The agent determined that a local computer was hosting images of child pornography using a peer-to-peer file sharing program, and was able to download several pornographic videos from this computer. Further investigation traced the Internet subscriber information to Copenhaver’s Jacksonville residence.

On February 6, 2014, law enforcement officers executed a federal search warrant at Copenhaver’s residence and seized a computer and an external hard disk drive. Copenhaver was at the residence. During an interview with agents, he admitted that he had been involved in downloading child pornography from the Internet for about five years. Subsequent analyses of Copenhaver’s external hard drive revealed that it contained videos depicting the sexual abuse of children.

This case was investigated by the Florida Department of Law Enforcement, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, and the Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office. It was prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorney D. Rodney Brown.

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 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.justice.gov/psc.