Indiana Man Sentenced to 135 Months in Prison for Transmitting Child Pornography Via the Internet

WASHINGTON—David L. Franklin, a 57-year-old Warren, Indiana man, was sentenced to 135 months in prison for interstate transportation of child pornography and 120 months in prison, to be served concurrently, for possession of child pornography, Acting U.S. Attorney Channing D. Phillips, FBI Assistant Director in Charge, Washington Field Office, Joseph Persichini, Jr., and Metropolitan Police Department Chief Cathy L. Lanier announced today. Franklin received his sentence on Wednesday, October 14, 2009, in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia before the Honorable Emmet G. Sullivan, who also sentenced Franklin to 180 months supervised release upon completion of his prison term, during which time he will have to register as a sex offender, and have restrictions placed on his contact with children, as well as his computer and internet use.

The sentence follows Franklin’s guilty plea in February 2009 to interstate transportation of child pornography and possession of child pornography. Franklin admitted during his plea proceeding that between August 21, 2008, and August 29, 2008, he communicated on-line, via computer, with an individual who, unbeknownst to Franklin at the time, was a detective with the Metropolitan Police Department of the District of Columbia (“MPD”), working undercover within the District of Columbia. During that same period, Franklin transmitted to the MPD detective, via the Internet, six videos and four still images depicting the sexual abuse, by adult males, of children -- all of whom appeared to be under the age of 10, and some of whom appeared to be under the age of two.

On September 4, 2008, the MPD detective, along with FBI agents, executed a search warrant at the home of Franklin in Warren, Indiana. During the search, law enforcement officers seized from Franklin’s home, among other things, an Acer Aspire laptop. Subsequent forensic analysis of that laptop revealed six videos and four still images depicting the sexual abuse of children by adult males -- each of which previously had been transmitted to the MPD detective by Franklin. Forensic analysis of the laptop also indicated that Franklin transmitted and possessed a total of at least 454 images of child pornography.

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 U.S. 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.

In announcing the sentence, Acting U.S. Attorney Phillips, FBI Assistant Director in Charge Persichini, and MPD Chief Lanier commended the work of Washington Metropolitan Police Detective Timothy Palchak, who conducted the undercover investigation, and an FBI Special Agent of the Washington Field Office, both of whom are members of the MPD-FBI District of Columbia Child Exploitation Task Force. They also praised the work of John Marsh, Criminal Investigator with the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Columbia, who conducted the forensic analysis of Franklin’s computer, as well as the work of U.S. Attorney’s Office Investigators Jonathan Andrews and Miguel Miranda who assisted with supplemental investigation of the case. Lastly, they praised the work of Assistant U.S. Attorney Lovita Morris King of the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of Indiana for her assistance with the search warrant in this case, and Assistant U.S. Attorney Renata Kendrick Cooper, who investigated and prosecuted the case.