A Colorado City man, Skyler Shoemaker, was sentenced to 19 years in federal prison for distributing child sexual abuse material. The sentencing was announced by United States Attorney for the Northern District of Texas Ryan Raybould.
Shoemaker, 34, was indicted in May and pleaded guilty three months later to the charge of Distribution of Child Pornography. On December 11, 2025, U.S. District Judge James Wesley Hendrix handed down a sentence of 228 months in federal prison.
Court documents revealed that Shoemaker used Facebook Messenger to send a sexually explicit video involving a four- to six-year-old child to his girlfriend, Angel Bradford. Additional information presented at the sentencing indicated that Shoemaker distributed child pornography using various online platforms and engaged in sex acts in front of minors.
Bradford, 33, from Hermleigh, Texas, was indicted alongside Shoemaker in May 2025. She pleaded guilty to Receipt of Child Pornography in July and was sentenced on November 6, 2025, by Judge Hendrix to five years in federal prison.
The investigation involved the FBI Dallas Field Office – Abilene Resident Agency, the Texas Department of Public Safety, and the Abilene Police Department’s Cyber Crimes Unit. Assistant U.S. Attorney Whitney Ohlhausen prosecuted the case.
"The Justice Department is committed to combating child sexual exploitation and brought this case as part of Project Safe Childhood, a nationwide initiative to combat the epidemic of child sexual exploitation and abuse launched in May 2006 by the Department of Justice. Led by U.S. Attorneys’ Offices and 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," according to a statement from the department.
The Justice Department partners with organizations such as the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC), which operates a hotline at 1-800-THE-LOST and provides resources at missingkids.org for reporting suspected child sexual exploitation.
