News Releases

San Antonio man sentenced to 17 years for distributing child pornography

SAN ANTONIO - A local man was sentenced on Thursday to 17 years in federal prison for distributing child pornography, announced U.S. Attorney John E. Murphy, Western District of Texas. The sentencing resulted from an investigation conducted by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).

Brett Tomas Gonzalez, 28, was sentenced May 6 by U.S. District Judge Orlando Garcia to 210 months in federal prison. The judge also ordered Gonzalez to serve 50 years of supervised release.

On Feb. 11, 2009, ICE executed a search warrant at Gonzalez's residence. Agents seized the Gonzalez's computer and other computer media. A forensics examination of the seized items revealed the presence of 15,000 images of child pornography and 1,200 videos downloaded from the Internet.
In April 2010, Gonzalez pleaded guilty to one-count of information charging him with distributing child pornography.

Gonzalez' arrest was part of Operation Predator, an ICE initiative to protect children from sexual predators, including those who travel overseas for sex with minors, Internet child pornographers, criminal alien sex offenders and child sex traffickers. Since ICE launched Operation Predator in 2003, more than 12,000 child sex predators, sex tourists and child pornographers have been arrested.

ICE encourages the public to report suspected child predators and any suspicious activity through its toll-free hotline at 1-866-DHS-2ICE. This hotline is staffed around the clock by investigators.

Suspected child sexual exploitation or missing children may be reported to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, an Operation Predator partner, at 1-800-843-5678 or http://www.cybertipline.com.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Tracy Thompson, Western District of Texas prosecuted this case.