Daniel T. Eckstrom, 32, of Lake Station, Indiana, was
sentenced to 240 years of imprisonment followed by lifetime supervised release
for his nine criminal convictions for production, distribution and possession
of child pornography, announced U.S. Attorney David Capp for the Northern
District of Indiana.
According to documents filed in the case, on Jan. 17, 2014,
Eckstrom pleaded guilty to seven charges of producing child pornography, one
charge of distributing child pornography and one charge of possessing child
pornography.
The production of child pornography charges were based on
Eckstrom’s capturing of thousands of images and hundreds of videos depicting
three minor female victims under the age of 12 being caused to engage in
sexually explicit conduct. One victim
was sexually abused by Eckstrom over a period of five years. The court found that Eckstrom had used force
to cause her to engage in sexual acts and also used threats of violence. Based on the evidence of child pornography
production presented at sentencing, the court concluded that Eckstrom was a
repeat and dangerous sex offender and sentenced him to consecutive terms of 30
years on each of the seven production of child pornography charges.
On the distribution of child pornography charge, the
evidence presented at sentencing established that Eckstrom distributed
depictions of two of his victims to others.
As a result, over 600 depictions of one victim have been found in seven
investigations in six different U.S. states and over 10,000 depictions of
another have been found in 77 investigations in 29 different states. Eckstrom received a 20 year sentence for his
distribution of child pornography charge and another 10 years for possession of
child pornography, both consecutive to each other and consecutive to the
production charges.
The investigation in this case began when Homeland Security
Investigations (HSI) out of Salt Lake City, Utah, located an individual
suspected of producing child pornography in Sandy, Utah and distributing the
material via an email account. Upon
further investigation, that target was found to be trading depictions,
including depictions produced by Eckstrom, with another target out of Syracuse,
New York. When the material was sent to
the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, an investigator with
that agency helped identify Eckstrom.
Once Eckstrom was located in northwest Indiana, local agents with HSI
obtained a federal warrant to search his residence.
This case was a culmination of the great work that can be
accomplished from outstanding coordination between various law enforcement
agencies around the country to identify and bring serial child sexual abusers
to justice.
This case was investigated by the U.S. Department of
Homeland Security Investigations and prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Jill
R. Koster.
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