WOMAN SENTENCED TO EIGHT YEARS IN
FEDERAL PRISON FOR PRODUCING CHILD PORNOGRAPHY
David B. Fein, United States Attorney for the District of Connecticut, announced that LAURA CULVER, 56, was sentenced today by Senior United States District Judge Warren W. Eginton in Bridgeport to 96 months of imprisonment, followed by three years of supervised release, for producing child pornography.
According to court documents and statements made in court, in 2001 and 2002, while residing in Connecticut, CULVER collaborated with Edgardo Sensi to videotape a minor girl engaging in sexually explicit conduct. The minor girl was approximately 8-years-old at the time of the offense and the videotaped sessions include CULVER and Sensi engaging in illicit sex acts with the victim. In portions of the videotapes, CULVER and Sensi question the victim about whether the victim is telling anyone about what they are doing to her and instruct the victim not to say anything.
“The crimes committed against the victim in this case are among the most abhorrent crimes that a member of our society can commit,” stated U.S. Attorney Fein. “I commend ICE HSI and state and local law enforcement in Florida and Georgia for ensuring that these defendants were brought to justice.”
CULVER has been detained since her arrest on October 3, 2008. On April 2, 2009, she pleaded guilty to one count of production of child pornography.
To date, there is no evidence the videos have been possessed by anyone other than Sensi.
On July 8, 2010, Sensi pleaded guilty to child pornography and sexual tourism offenses related to his sexual abuse of minor girls in the United States and Nicaragua. Sensi, who is also detained, is scheduled to be sentenced by Judge Eginton tomorrow, January 31, at 10:00 a.m.
This matter has been investigated by ICE Homeland Security Investigations in New Haven, with the assistance of ICE HSI in Atlanta and Fort Pierce (FL), the ICE attaché office in Panama and ICE International Affairs in Washington, D.C.; the U.S. Department of State, Bureau of Diplomatic Security, Regional Security Office, Managua; the Martin County (FL) Sheriff’s Office, the Jones County (GA) Sheriff’s Office, and the Georgia Bureau of Investigation.
This case is being prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Krishna R. Patel and U.S. Attorney David B. Fein.
This prosecution is part of the United States Department of Justice’s Project Safe Childhood Initiative, a nationwide initiative designed to protect children from online exploitation and abuse. 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 identify and rescue victims. For more information about Project Safe Childhood, please visit www.projectsafechildhood.gov.
PUBLIC AFFAIRS CONTACT:
U.S. ATTORNEY'S OFFICE
Tom Carson
(203) 821-3722
thomas.carson@usdoj.gov
