Retired Lawyer Pleads in Child Porn Case; Feds to Ask for 5- to 9-Year Sentence
A retired New York lawyer living in New Mexico originally facing five counts of receiving child pornography and two counts of possessing child pornography pleaded guilty this week to one count of knowingly receiving an illicit video. In exchange, the prosecution agreed to recommend a sentence of five to nine years in federal prison.
Robert Warren, 70, was taken into custody immediately after his plea on Monday, reports the Albuquerque Journal (sub. req.). He could face a sentence of as much as 20 years, plus a $250,000 fine.
After the Holocaust history and author was indicted last year, his lawyer, Peter Schoenburg, emphasized that Warren had no prior record and he has since told the newspaper that his client was a “passive voyeur” who was not involved in producing child porn, according to the Albuquerque newspaper and the Santa Fe New Mexican.
However, “what we can never forget in these child pornography cases is that there are real children—little boys and little girls—who were horribly abused in order to manufacture these images of child sexual abuse,” says U.S. Attorney Kenneth Gonzales said in a written statement. “Their lives were unalterably scarred for the viewing pleasure of persons that are attracted to this type of material.”
The New Mexican reports that Warren was targeted in an FBI investigation in 2006 of a list of 2,500 subscribers to a paid child porn site. In a sting operation, in which the agency sent subscribers a free trial offer for another child porn site.
A subsequent search of Warren’s computer, pursuant to a warrant, allegedly discovered thousands of child porn images.
His sentencing date hasn’t yet been set.
