U.S. Attorney George E. B. Holding said in the release that the laws under which Sherwin was first prosecuted in Utah weren’t severe enough to keep him incarcerated.“This defendant had previously been prosecuted for his use of child pornography under laws that provided no serious punishment for his conduct,” he said. “As a result, two innocent children have now suffered harms we can never completely repair.”
Sherwin was initially arrested by State Bureau of Investigation agents in June and charged with 11 child sex offenses, including two counts of first-degree child rape, three counts of first-degree sex offense on a child and six counts of first-degree sexual exploitation of a minor.
An Elizabeth City man is facing approximately 35 years in prison after he pleaded guilty in federal court this week to two counts of manufacturing child pornography.
Daniel Carl Sherwin, 29, of the 1000 block of Four Forks Road, pleaded guilty in U.S. District Court Monday in Raleigh before U.S. District Court Judge Terrence Boyle, according to a press release from the U.S. Attorney’s Office. Sherwin’s sentencing is expected to take place in February.
Sherwin was initially arrested by State Bureau of Investigation agents in June and charged with 11 child sex offenses, including two counts of first-degree child rape, three counts of first-degree sex offense on a child and six counts of first-degree sexual exploitation of a minor.In October, he was indicted by federal authorities on 11 similar counts.
The charges resulted from a federal investigation that suspected Sherwin of participating in an online group that shared images of child pornography, the release states.
When agents searched Sherwin’s computer, they discovered that not only was he sharing pornographic images of children online, he was also using two children to make child pornography of his own, the release states.
Sherwin is charged with taking photos of two young children engaged in sexual acts, raping one of them and committing sexual offenses with both of them, according to arrest warrants. On the sexual exploitation charges, Sherwin is charged with using the children “to engage in sexual activity by manufacturing a digital still image for the purpose of producing material containing a visual representation depicting this activity.”
According to the release, Sherwin is a registered sex offender who was convicted in Tooele County, Utah, in 2003 of eight counts of second-degree sexual exploitation of a minor.
Sherwin is facing 25 years in prison as a result of his guilty plea to two counts of manufacturing pornography. He’s facing an additional 10 years in federal prison because his crimes were committed while he was registered as a sex offender.
Sherwin’s prosecution is part of a U.S. Department of Justice initiative called Project Safe Childhood that was formed in 2006 to fight child exploitation crimes perpetrated through the use of technology.
U.S. Attorney George E. B. Holding said in the release that the laws under which Sherwin was first prosecuted in Utah weren’t severe enough to keep him incarcerated.“This defendant had previously been prosecuted for his use of child pornography under laws that provided no serious punishment for his conduct,” he said. “As a result, two innocent children have now suffered harms we can never completely repair.”
According to the Project Safe Childhood’s Web site, U.S. Attorney offices charged 2,218 defendants in sexual exploitation cases in fiscal year 2007 and expects to have an even larger number of prosecutions this year. The 2007 figures are a 27.8 percent increase from 2006.
"25% of all sex offenders re-offend within 15 years"
.........Sarah Tofte
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