A Miami-Dade County resident was sentenced to a term of imprisonment of 151 months for receipt of child pornography.

Wifredo A. Ferrer, United States Attorney for the Southern District of Florida, Neil Melofchik, Acting Special Agent in Charge, United States Secret Service (USSS), Miami Field Office, George L. Piro, Special Agent in Charge, Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), Alysa D. Erichs, Special Agent in Charge, United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s Homeland Security Investigations (ICE-HSI), J.D. Patterson Jr., Director, Miami Dade Police Department (MDPD), Daniel J. Oates, Chief, Miami Beach Police Department (MBPD) and Leonard Burgess, Chief, North Miami Police Department (NMPD), made the announcement.

Jefferson Sanchez, 32, of Homestead, was sentenced yesterday to 151 months in prison, to be followed by a lifetime of supervised release. Sanchez was also ordered to register as a sex offender upon his release from prison. Sanchez previously pled guilty to receiving a visual depiction of a minor engaged in sexually explicit conduct, in violation of Title 18, United States Code, Section 2252(a)(2).

According to court documents and information provided in court, on January 29, 2015, law enforcement officers executed a search warrant at Sanchez’s home after receiving information that a computer user at the residence was downloading child pornography. While executing the search warrant, agents followed a trail of water from the bathroom to a closet, where they found Sanchez’s wet laptop inside a storage bin covered by clothes. A forensic examination of the computer revealed videos and images of child pornography and that the defendant had downloaded a child pornography video just before agents executed the search warrant.

Mr. Ferrer commended the investigative efforts of the USSS, FBI, ICE-HSI, MDPD, MBPD and NMPD. This case was prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Jonathan Kobrinski.

This case was brought as part of Project Safe Childhood, a nationwide initiative to combat the growing epidemic of child exploitation and abuse launched in May 2006 by the Department of Justice. Led by U.S. Attorney’s Offices and the Criminal Division’s Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section, 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.

A copy of this press release may be found on the website of the United States Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of Florida at www.usdoj.gov/usao/fls. Related court documents and information may be found on the website of the District Court for the Southern District of Florida at www.flsd.uscourts.gov or on http://pacer.flsd.uscourts.gov.