Decatur Man to Serve 90 Years in Prison for Child Sex Crimes

 Federal 50-Year Sentence to be Served Consecutive to 40-Year State Sentence

PEORIA, Ill. – U.S. District Judge James E. Shadid today sentenced Gary L. Boyle, 36, of Decatur, Ill., to 50 years in federal prison for sexual exploitation of a child and child pornography. Boyle’s federal sentence will be served consecutive to a state sentence of 40 years ordered in September 2020 in Macon County Court for predatory criminal sexual assault. Boyle, of the 5400 block of West Main St., was remanded to the U.S. Marshals Service.

In court documents and at today’s hearing, the government described Boyle as “a manipulative pedophile who consumes young children for his own sexual pleasure,”  and as an avid collector of violent child pornography. Evidence demonstrates that Boyle’s collection included images of violent sexual acts committed by adults against toddlers and six-to eight-year old children who are nude and bound with rope at their wrists. Boyle participated in online child exploitation groups where he traded child pornography and ultimately live-streamed abuse against an eight-year-old victim.

On Sept. 6, 2020, Boyle pleaded guilty to seven counts of child sexual exploitation and one count of possession of child pornography.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Elly M. Peirson represented the government in the federal case. The charges are the result of an investigation by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement Homeland Security Investigations, the Decatur Police Department, and the Macon County Sheriff’s Office.

The case was brought as part of Project Safe Childhood, a nationwide initiative to combat the growing epidemic of child sexual exploitation and abuse launched in May 2006 by the Department of Justice.  Led by U.S. 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 via the Internet as well as to identify and rescue victims.  For more information about Project Safe Childhood, please visit www.projectsafechildhood.gov.