United States Attorney Anne M. Tompkins Western District Of North Carolina
ASHEVILLE, N.C. - A Burke County man was sentenced on Thursday, April 24, 2014, to serve 90 months in a federal prison for possession, receipt, and distribution of child pornography, announced Anne M. Tompkins, U.S. Attorney for the Western District of North Carolina. U.S. District Judge Martin Reidinger also ordered the defendant to register as a sex offender and serve the rest of his life under court supervision after he is released from prison.
Greg McLeod, Director of the North Carolina State Bureau of Investigation (NC SBI) and Sheriff Steve E. Whisenant of the Burke County Sheriff’s Office join U.S. Attorney Tompkins in making today’s announcement.
In November 2012, a federal criminal indictment charged Eddie Wayne Lane, Jr, 27, of Connelly Springs, N.C. with one count of possession of visual depictions of minors engaging in sexually explicit conduct, one count of receiving such images, and one count of distributing them. Lane pleaded guilty to the charges in April 2013. According to court filings and proceedings, during the investigation, detectives discovered an extensive collection of child pornography including a computer hard drive and multiple email accounts. Lane’s investigation led to the prosecution of Michael John Jones who was sentenced to 25 years in prison for producing child pornography. The U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of West Virginia handled Jones’ prosecution. For information on that case is available at: http://www.justice.gov/usao/wvn/news/2012/august/jones.html and http://www.justice.gov/usao/wvn/news/2012/august/jones.html.
Lane is in local federal custody and will be transferred into custody of the Federal Bureau of Prisons upon designation of a federal facility. Federal sentences are served without the possibility of parole.
The investigation into Lane was handled by the SBI and the Burke County Sheriff’s Office. Both agencies are members of the North Carolina Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force (ICAC). Assistant U.S. Attorneys David A. Thorneloe and Cortney S. Randall of the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Western District of North Carolina prosecuted the case.
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 U.S. 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.
Source: U.S. Department of Justice, Office of the United States Attorneys
