POCATELLO - D. Gregory Schvaneveldt, 40, of Preston, Idaho, was sentenced today in United States District Court to 96 months in prison followed by seven years of supervised release, U.S. Attorney Wendy J. Olson announced. U.S. District Judge Edward J. Lodge also ordered Schvaneveldt to pay $10,250 in restitution to victims of the crime and to forfeit computers and related property used in the commission of the offense. Schvaneveldt pleaded guilty to the charge on August 12, 2015.
According to the plea agreement, an undercover special agent with Homeland Security Investigations was able to download 48 images and four videos of child pornography from Schvaneveldt’s shared computer files, after Schvaneveldt shared the password protecting the files with the agent during an online chat. This led to a federal search warrant for Schvaneveldt’s residence, where law enforcement agents seized two computers, an external hard drive, and related equipment. On the computers and external hard drive, law enforcement agents discovered approximately 1,638 images and 409 video files of suspected child pornography. The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children identified victims in over 600 of the images and videos.
When interviewed by law enforcement, Schvaneveldt admitted that there was child pornography on the computers in his residence and “hundreds” of images on the external hard drive. He stated that he had found child pornography on the Internet about a year prior and admitted saving images of child pornography from the Internet to his computer. He also admitted to receiving child pornography through an online chat function.
The case was investigated by U.S. Immigration and Custom Enforcement’s (ICE) Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) and was brought as part of Project Safe Childhood, a nationwide initiative launched in May 2006 by the Department of Justice to combat the growing epidemic of child sexual exploitation and abuse. Led by the United States Attorneys’ Offices and the Criminal Division’s Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section, Project Safe Childhood marshals federal, state, and local resources to locate, apprehend, and prosecute individuals who sexually exploit children, and to identify and rescue victims. For more information about Project Safe Childhood, please visit www.usdoj.gov/psc. For more information about internet safety education, please visit www.usdoj.gov/psc and click on the tab “resources.”