U.S. District Judge Ellen L. Hollander, this past Friday, June 17, sentenced 50-year-old Armando Ramirez, Jr., of Odenton, Maryland, to six years in federal prison, followed by 10 years of supervised release, for receipt of child pornography. Judge Hollander also ordered that, upon his release from prison, Ramirez must register as a sex offender in the places where he resides, where he is an employee, and where he is a student, under the Sex Offender Registration and Notification Act (“SORNA”).
The sentence was announced by United States Attorney for the District of Maryland Erek L. Barron; Anne and HSI Baltimore Anne Arundel County Police Chief Amal E. Awad; and Acting Special Agent in Charge Selwyn Smith of Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) Baltimore.
According to his guilty plea, between March 19, 2020, and March 28, 2020, law enforcement observed Ramirez’s home IP address access several files of child pornography including a 1-minute and 37-second video depicting a naked prepubescent female engaged in oral sex with an adult male.
Additionally, on March 21, 2020, using the same IP address, Ramirez requested a 48-second video of an adult sexually assaulting a prepubescent female in her sleep.
As stated in his plea agreement, on August 20, 2020, investigators executed a search warrant at Ramirez’s residence where several items were seized including a USB hard drive, two laptops, 1GB USB flash drive, and a 500GB USB hard drive. During the forensic review of the digital devices, law enforcement located 90,000 images and 3,000 videos, and 42 files of child pornography. Some of the images and videos depicted the sexual abuse of toddlers.
This case was 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 the United States Attorney’s 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. For more information about Internet safety education, please visit www.justice.gov/psc and click on the “Resources” tab on the left of the page.
United States Attorney Erek L. Barron commended HSI, and the Anne Arundel Police Department for their work in the investigation. Mr. Barron thanked Assistant U.S. Attorneys Adam K. Ake, who prosecuted the federal case.
