Columbus Man to Serve 12 Years in Prison for Advertising Child Pornography on Internet-Based Bulletin Board

COLUMBUS—Christopher J. Klein, 47, of Columbus, was sentenced in United States District Court here today to 180 months in prison for advertising child pornography on a national Internet-based, members-only child pornography bulletin board known as “Lost Boy” and 60 months in prison for receipt of child pornography. The sentences were ordered to run concurrently.

Carter M. Stewart, United States Attorney for the Southern District of Ohio; Edward J. Hanko, Special Agent in Charge, Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI); and Dugan T. Wong, Assistant Inspector in Charge, U.S. Postal Inspection Service, announced the sentence handed down today by Senior United States District Judge George C. Smith.

Klein pleaded guilty on April 19, 2011 to the crimes. According to a statement of facts filed with the plea agreement, Klein and others set up Lost Boy in September 2007 as a forum for trading child pornography. “Klein knew that Lost Boy was reserved for serious traders of child pornography; by its very nature, membership in Lost Boy constituted an offer to receive, exchange, display, distribute, and reproduce child pornography,” the statement of facts read.

On September 30, 2010, agents executed a federal search warrant at Klein’s house. When they entered the house, they found Klein in the process of knowingly downloading child pornography to his computer. Thousands of additional images of child pornography were found on Klein’s computer. Agents arrested Klein. He has been in custody since his arrest.

A federal grand jury in the Central District of California initially indicted Klein and others as part of their investigation into Lost Boy.

Stewart commended the cooperative investigation by Special Agents of the FBI and Postal Inspectors, as well as Trial Attorney Andrew McCormack with the U.S. Department of Justice Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section, Assistant U.S. Attorney Joey Blanch in the Central District of California and Assistant U.S. Attorney Michael Hunter in the Southern District of Ohio, who prosecuted the case.