North Wilmington Man Pleads Guilty to Production and Transportation of Child Pornography
Leonard Wasylyk, age 49, of Wilmington, Delaware, pled guilty today to production and transportation of child pornography, in violation of federal law. Charles M. Oberly, III, United States Attorney for the District of Delaware and John P. Kelleghan, special agent in charge of ICE HSI in Philadelphia, announced the guilty plea following a hearing in the United States District Court for the District of Delaware.
Wasylyk, who will be sentenced on January 4, 2012 by United States District Judge Sue L. Robinson, faces a mandatory minimum sentence of fifteen years and a maximum sentence of thirty years in prison on the production of child pornography charge. He faces a mandatory minimum sentence of five years and a maximum sentence of twenty years in prison on the transportation of child pornography conviction. Wasylyk also faces a term of supervised release of five years to life following his prison sentence, and will be required to register as a sex offender in any jurisdiction in which he lives, works, or attends school. Wasylyk has been detained since his December 9, 2010 arrest.
According to statements made and documents filed in court, an undercover agent from the Wilmington office of the Department of Homeland Security identified Wasylyk during an online undercover investigation into a private peer-to-peer network being used to trade images of child pornography. After downloading computer files containing child pornography
from Wasylyk’s home computer, federal agents arrested Wasylyk and executed a search warrant at his North Wilmington residence on December 9, 2010. Law enforcement agents recovered a computer from Wasylyk’s bedroom that contained over 60,000 images of child pornography. The majority of these images depict mostly prepubescent, adolescent and teenage boys engaged in sex acts with other boys or adult males. Through a forensic analysis of Wasylyk’s computer, agents learned that Wasylyk had traded images of child pornography with approximately 150 individuals, with whom he had engaged in over 15,500 instant message chats.
During the forensic review of Wasylyk’s computer, agents discovered over 60 images of a young boy engaged in sexually explicit conduct with Wasylyk in the bedroom of his Wilmington residence. Agents subsequently identified the child and located him in Southeastern Pennsylvania. The child reported that Wasylyk produced the sexually explicit images when the boy was 12 or 13 years old. The forensic analysis also revealed that Wasylyk distributed the sexually explicit images of the child that he produced to other child sex offenders while bragging about having molested the boy.
Following the plea hearing, United States Attorney Charles M. Oberly, III stated, “The sexual abuse of a child is among the heinous of crimes in our society. Mr. Wasylyk didn’t stop with his physical abuse of this child or with trading images of child pornography made by others.
He photographed his sexual abuse of a child and then distributed the images of that abuse to like-minded child sex offenders for their shared, perverse enjoyment. By doing so, Mr. Wasylyk ensured that his physical and psychological abuse of this child will be perpetuated in the online world, just as each image of child pornography perpetuates each child’s sexual abuse. Today’s guilty plea ensures that Mr. Wasylyk is held fully accountable for his despicable crimes by serving a minimum sentence of 15 years and perhaps much longer.”
“HSI is determined to purge our communities of child predators who victimize our nation’s most vulnerable – our children,” said John P. Kelleghan, special agent in charge of ICE HSI in Philadelphia. “The emotional scars the victims carry last a lifetime. People who commit such crimes will be held accountable.”
