Wifredo A. Ferrer, United States Attorney for the Southern District of Florida, Ric L. Bradshaw, Sheriff, Palm Beach County Sheriff’s Office, and G. Matthew Immler, Chief, Boynton Beach Police Department, announce that defendant Allen Mark Levinson, 68, of West Palm Beach, Florida was sentenced today for using a computer to attempt to entice a minor to engage in sexual activity, and committing the enticement while being required by law to register as a sexual offender. United States District Court Judge Kenneth L. Ryskamp sentenced Levinson to 40 years in prison.

According to testimony at trial, Levinson, who had previously been convicted of the aggravated sexual abuse of a 7 year old child, entered an internet chat room named “dadanddaughtersex.” While in the chat room, Levinson engaged in a chat with the purported father of an 8 year old child. The purported father was actually an undercover police officer.

During the on-line conversations with the undercover officer, Levinson bragged about having repeatedly molested his own daughter throughout her childhood. Levinson requested that the undercover police officer put his 8 year old daughter on a web camera. Once Levinson believed that he was communicating with the father and the 8 year old child (played by another undercover officer) via web cam, Levinson engaged in sexual activity and asked the father and child to do the same. Levinson’s computers were seized and found to contain child pornography, virtual child pornography, and hundreds of other chats in which Levinson communicated to others his desire to molest children.

This 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 United States 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.

Mr. Ferrer commended the investigative efforts of the Palm Beach County Sheriff’s Office and Boynton Beach Police Department. The case was prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorneys Rinku Tribuiani and Shaniek Maynard.

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A copy of this press release may be found on the website of the United States Attorney's Office for the Southern District of Florida at http://www.usdoj.gov/usao/fls. Related court documents and information may be found on the website of the District Court for the Southern District of Florida at http://www.flsd.uscourts.gov or on http://pacer.flsd.uscourts.gov.