Faribault Man Sentenced to 30 Years in Prison for Producing Child Pornography

A 39-year-old Faribault man was sentenced earlier today in federal court in Minneapolis for producing a video containing child pornography. United States District Court Judge Joan N. Ericksen sentenced Michael Angelo Borromeo to 360 months in prison and a lifetime of supervised release on one count of production of child pornography. Borromeo was indicted on October 22, 2009, and pled guilty on March 26, 2010.

In his plea agreement, Borromeo admitted that on June 21, 2008, he produced a video featuring a minor engaged in sexually explicit conduct. He used his cell phone to film the 14-year-old. Borromeo was arrested on February 11, 2009, following an investigation by the Rice County Sheriff’s Office, the Faribault Police Department, and the Federal Bureau of Investigation. He pled guilty to state charges related to this conduct as well as other conduct that involved the sexual exploitation of minors. Presently, he is in federal custody; however, he is still waiting to be sentenced in the state court case. The state court case was prosecuted by the Rice County Attorney’s Office, while the federal case was prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Lisa D. Kirkpatrick.

The U.S. Department of Justice is committed to combating the sexual exploitation of children. It recently submitted to Congress the first-ever National Strategy for Child Exploitation Prevention and Interdiction. That strategy seeks to strengthens many of the weapons already used in the fight against the proliferation of technology-based sexual exploitation crimes involving children.

For example, the federal website established in 2006 as part of Project Safe Childhood, the initial national effort to address Internet-facilitated sex crimes against children, is being relaunched after being improved for better information sharing and crime reporting. The U.S. Marshals Service is launching an operation to locate and apprehend the 500 most dangerous unregistered sex offenders in the country. And, the Justice Department is developing a national database that will allow federal, state, local, and tribal law enforcement agencies to deconflict their cases.

For more information about Project Safe Childhood or this new Strategy, please visit http://www.projectsafechildhood.gov/.