Burnsville Man Sentenced To 20 Years In Prison For Producing Child Pornography Via Instagram And X-Box

United States Attorney Erica H. MacDonald today announced the sentencing of MARCUS ALEXANDER HINKLE, 22, to 240 months in prison for producing child pornography using Instagram and X-Box. HINKLE, who pleaded guilty on September 19, 2018, to two counts of was sentenced before Judge Susan Richard Nelson in U.S. District Court in Saint Paul, Minnesota.

U.S. Attorney MacDonald said, “Sextortion crimes such as this are prevalent and often victimize the most vulnerable in our society, children. This office will continue to use all available resources to prosecute and prevent these devastating crimes.”

According to the defendant’s guilty plea and documents filed in court, from May 2017 through July 2017, HINKLE used several Instagram accounts he created under various names, including “Nation_Of_Nerve,” “Nation_Of_Nerve_VIP,” and “Globalspamnation,” to contact and communicate with minor males. HINKLE also used an X-box to communicate with the minors and to obtain sexually explicit images. HINKLE falsely represented to the minors that he was fifteen years old.

According to the defendant’s guilty plea and documents filed in court, in May of 2017, HINKLE contacted Minor #1 via Instagram and, through the course of their on-line conversations, HINKLE pressured Minor #1 to send sexually explicit images and videos. Between late June and early July of 2017, HINKLE used Minor #1 to be “introduced” to Minor #2 and, after approximately one week of communicating on-line, HINKLE asked Minor #2 to send to him sexually explicit images and videos via Instagram. HINKLE continued to pressure Minor #2 for more sexually explicit images and videos and threatened to post sexually explicit pictures of Minor #2 in a group chat if he did not comply. HINKLE did in fact send out a group chat message that contained sexually explicit pictures of Minor #2. Hinkle admitted to engaging in the same conduct with other minors.  More than a dozen minors were victimized by HINKLE.

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, 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.

If you know of any child who may have been a victim of exploitation, please call the National Center for Missing or Exploited Children (NCMEC) at 1-800-THE-LOST (1-800-843-5678) or visit NCMEC’s web site at www.missingkids.com.

This case was prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorney Carol M. Kayser.

This case is the result of an investigation conducted by the FBI, the Eagan Police Department, and the Warren (Michigan) Police Department.

Defendant Information:

MARCUS ALEXANDER HINKLE, 22

Burnsville, Minn.

Convicted:

    Production of child pornography, 2 counts

Sentenced:

    240 months  in prison

    Lifetime of supervised release