Andrew M. Luger, U.S. Attorney | U.S. Attorney for the District of Minnesota
A Winona resident, Valentin Silva Quintana, has been sentenced to 27 years in prison followed by 20 years of supervised release for his involvement in an online sextortion scheme. The announcement was made by Acting U.S. Attorney Lisa D. Kirkpatrick.
Court documents reveal that between April 2022 and June 2023, Quintana targeted over 60 young girls through social media platforms like Snapchat and Instagram. His victims were primarily aged between 9 and 12, residing in locations such as Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, Texas, New Zealand, among others. He often used fake identities and misrepresented his age to gain the trust of these minors.
Quintana employed various coercive tactics to exploit his victims. He sometimes posed as a friend or romantic interest or offered monetary incentives. More commonly, he would manipulate the girls into sending explicit images or videos by threatening to share initial photos with their acquaintances unless they complied with his demands for increasingly graphic content.
Despite pleas from the victims to cease his actions, Quintana persisted in his extortion activities. On February 5, 2025, he was sentenced by Judge Jerry W. Blackwell at the U.S. District Court after pleading guilty to charges including production and distribution of child pornography.
The investigation leading to this conviction was conducted by the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension, Homeland Security Investigations, and the Winona County Sheriff’s Office. Assistant U.S. Attorney Michael McBride prosecuted the case.
