Cincinnati Man Sentenced to 51 Years for Producing Child Pornography

CINCINNATI—Kenneth Rose, 39, of Cincinnati was sentenced in United States District Court to 612 months in prison for producing child pornography involving at least five children, including two who were 10 years old. Rose was also sentenced to serve the rest of his life under court supervision after he completes his prison time. Federal law will also require him to register as a sex offender.

Carter M. Stewart, United States Attorney for the Southern District of Ohio, Edward J. Hanko, Special Agent in Charge, Federal Bureau of Investigation Cincinnati (FBI), and Cincinnati Police Chief James Craig announced the sentence handed down today by U.S. District Judge Michael R. Barrett.

Cincinnati Police arrested Rose in November 2008 and charged him with raping multiple boys. They searched Rose’s house and seized a computer belonging to Rose. A forensic examination of the computer equipment conducted by the Regional Electronic Crimes Investigations Unit (“RECI”) revealed numerous digital images of child pornography. The images depicted at least five known victims and two who remain unknown, then under the age of 16, engaged in sexually explicit conduct as well as lascivious display of their genitalia. Detectives with the Cincinnati Police Department Personal Crimes Unit investigated and identified several of the children involved in the images as being associated with the defendant.

Rose was convicted on the state rape charges and is serving a 30-year sentence. He also pleaded guilty on December 14, 2010 to three federal charges of producing child pornography involving three different children. He was sentenced to 204 months on each of the three counts with the sentences to run consecutively. He was ordered to serve the federal sentence concurrently with the 30-year state sentence, completing his federal sentence after he serves his time on the state charges.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Christy Muncy told the court that Rose “masqueraded in his community as a person worthy of trust. Parents left their children in his care because he presented himself as a role model. In reality, he preyed upon the innocence of their children’s youth. He paid young boys to engage in sex acts with him. He lured them into his home. In exchange for sex, he paid them with gift cards and baseball caps. He stole their childhood…. His victims’ sentences will be life-long. The defendant’s sentence should be no less.”

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 United States 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, as well as to identify and rescue victims. For more information about Project Safe Childhood, please visit www.projectsafechildhood.gov.

Stewart commended the cooperative investigation by Cincinnati Police detectives, RECI investigators and FBI agents, as well as Assistant U.S. Attorney Muncy.