Former Plainfield Man Sentenced to Seven Years in Prison for Transporting Child Pornography

CHICAGO—A former southwest suburban Plainfield man was taken into custody this week to begin serving a seven-year federal prison sentence for transporting child pornography, federal law enforcement officials announced today. The defendant, Jay “Jerry” Engle, 58, most recently of Westfield, Ind., pleaded guilty in January, admitting that he was responsible for transporting at least 120 images and 10 videos of child pornography in November 2009. Engle made the images and videos available to a file-sharing network and an undercover law enforcement officer downloaded the materials directly from Engle’s computer network.

Before November 2009, Engle had installed software on his laptop computer to set up his own private peer-to-peer network of “friends” with whom he could share files over the Internet. He used the screen name “Skillett” on the network and placed hundreds of images of child pornography on a shared directory to make them available for his “friends” to download. Engle’s collection of child pornography totaled more than 600 image and video files, according to court documents.

The 84-month sentence, followed by lifetime supervised release, restrictions on using computers and the Internet, and a $5,000 fine was imposed on Wednesday by U.S. District Judge Matthew F. Kennelly. Engle faced a mandatory minimum sentence of five years. He must serve at least 85 percent of his seven-year sentence before he is eligible for release and there is no parole in the federal prison system. The sentence was announced today by Patrick J. Fitzgerald, United States Attorney for the Northern District of Illinois, and Robert D. Grant, Special Agent-in-Charge of the Chicago office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation.

In June 2010, after learning that FBI agents executed a federal search warrant at his home in Plainfield, Engle removed the file-sharing software on his computer and ran a program to erase its contents. He also drilled holes into an external USB drive on which he maintained his collection of child pornography and threw it in the garbage. When first interviewed by agents, Engle lied when he denied viewing child pornography, according to court documents

The investigation was conducted by the FBI’s Innocent Images Task Force. The government was represented by Assistant U.S. Attorney Heather McShain.