Las Vegas, Nev. - Daniel G. Bogden, United States Attorney for the District of Nevada, Ellen B. Knowlton, Special Agent-in-Charge of the Federal Bureau of Investigation for Nevada, and Clark County Sheriff Bill Young, of the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department, announce that THEODORE ALLEN FANGER, age 58, of Las Vegas, Nevada, entered guilty pleas in U.S. District Court yesterday to Transporting Child Pornography and Receipt of Child Pornography. FANGER also agreed to forfeit a computer that he used to transmit pornographic images of children.

According to the court records, in February 2002, an FBI Special Agent in Baltimore posing undercover in an internet chat room as a minor female, was contacted by FANGER who was using the screen name, "casinospvr." FANGER initiated sexually-oriented conversations with the agent and encouraged her to have sex with her father and with fathers of children for whom she babysits. FANGER also transmitted child pornography to the undercover agent over the internet. Subpoenas served on the internet service provider led investigating agents to a Las Vegas apartment. Local police obtained a state search warrant for FANGER's computer, and when the agents served the search warrant at the apartment, they found FANGER in his bedroom engaged in chat sessions on the computer. FANGER's computer was searched and found to contain approximately 9 pornographic videos of children and 20 pornographic images of children, including the ones he sent to the FBI Agent. FANGER's computer also contained fragments of sexually-explicit internet conversations about children between FANGER and others.

This was the first person in southern Nevada to be charged by the U.S. Attorney's Office with transporting child pornography. Numerous others have been charged and convicted for receiving and possessing child pornography.

FANGER is scheduled for sentencing on May 30, 2003, before U.S. District Court Judge Roger L. Hunt. Under federal statutes, FANGER faces up to 15 years in prison and a $250,000 fine on each of the charges. The actual sentence, however, will be dictated by the United States Sentencing Guidelines.

FANGER will remain in custody pending sentencing.

The case was investigated by Special Agents of the Federal Bureau of Investigation and Detectives with the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department, members of the Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force. It is being prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorney Nancy J. Koppe.

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