CHAMPAIGN — A 51-year-old Farmer City, Ill., man has been sentenced to 30 years in federal prison for his role in a highly sophisticated, global enterprise dedicated to the sexual exploitation of children, U.S. Attorney’s Office of the Central District of Illinois.
(Source: Macon County SO)
Brian W. Davis was sentenced to 360 months in prison for engaging in a child exploitation enterprise and two counts of production of child pornography, along with a lifetime term of supervised release.
Davis was sentenced along with 38-year-old David Delalio, of Longmont, Colorado, who was sentenced to 210 months in prison for engaging in a child exploitation enterprise and a 15-year term of supervised release.
U.S. District Judge Colin S. Bruce of the Central District of Illinois imposed the sentences yesterday and also ordered Davis to pay $164,000 in restitution and a $55,000 fine.
Davis pleaded guilty on July 15, 2015 and has remained in the custody of the U.S. Marshals Service since his arrest on Oct. 8, 2014. Delalio pleaded guilty on July 20, 2015.
According to the U.S. Department of Justice, Davis actively recruited and advised other members how to sexually abuse minors and produce child pornography for the website, according to the U.S.
He was predominantly interested in infants and toddlers, and sexually assaulted numerous minors entrusted to his care while he was employed by a child care facility in Champaign County, Ill.
Earlier this year, Jason Gmoser, Dakota Martin and Andrew Hoff were sentenced to prison for their involvement in the site.
According to the government’s sentencing memoranda, Davis and Delalio acted as members and co-administrators of a highly-sophisticated global enterprise dedicated to the sexual exploitation of children, organized via a members-only website that operated on the Tor anonymity network, through which he and others posted thousands of messages containing images of sexual exploitation involving pre-pubescent children.
As of July 2014, the website hosted nearly 30,000 members, who were required to share illicit child pornography images in order to gain and keep membership, including numerous child pornography producers who were actively abusing children, according to the government’s memorandum.
In addition, the sentencing memo shows that site members employed advanced technological means in order to undermine law enforcement’s attempts to identify them, including the use of a hidden service on the Tor anonymity network and elaborate file encryption.
The sentencing memos also state that Davis was the co-administrator of an exclusive “Producers” section of the website, where he acted as a gatekeeper and actively recruited and advised other members on how to sexually abuse minors and produce child pornography for the website.
Davis’s contributions to the website and his own produced materials focused predominantly on a sexual interest in infants and toddlers. Davis also sexually assaulted and produced child pornography involving numerous minors who were entrusted to his care while he was employed by a child care facility in Champaign County, Illinois.