Long Beach, Cerritos men arrested with 9 others after three-year child porn investigation

Authorities Tuesday arrested 11 Los Angeles area men, including a firefighter, accused of using peer-to-peer file-sharing programs to receive, possess or distribute child poography following a three-year investigation.

Operation Wide Net has resulted in dozens of defendants being prosecuted for child poography offenses and the execution of over 100 federal and state search warrants in the Los Angeles area over the last three years. Authorities Tuesday aounced the arrest of:

• Luis Gutierrez, 49, of Chino, was previously indicted by a federal grand jury on two counts of receiving child poography and one count of possessing child poography obtained through the use of the Ares file-sharing program. Gutierrez was an engineer with the Los Angeles City Fire Department in 2013 at the time of the alleged offenses and investigators believe that he used inteet coections at three different fire stations to download the child poography found on his computer.

• Gerald Patrick Beaver, 53, of Cerritos, was arrested based on operations in New Zealand and Oklahoma in which undercover officers allegedly observed him offering to distribute child poography over the inteet using the Gigatribe file-sharing program.

A federal grand jury previously indicted Beaver and charged him with one count of advertising child poography, two counts of distributing child poography and one count of possessing child poography. While searching Beaver’s home, authorities allegedly found more than 6,000 images and more than 400 videos of child poography on his computer.

• Jace Jeanes, 39, of Torrance, is charged with receipt of child poography and possession of child poography that he allegedly obtained using the BitTorrent file-sharing program. Jeanes allegedly possessed more than 20,000 images and videos of child poography on computer equipment found during a search of his residence.

• Steven David Lavinsky, 58, of Long Beach, is charged in a three-count indictment with advertising, distributing and possessing child poography in a case involving the Gigatribe file-sharing program.

• Keeth Martin Medellin, 55, of Carson, is charged with receipt of child poography and possession of child poography using the Limewire file-sharing program.

• Antonio Joseph Garcia II, 41, of Upland, is charged with four counts of distributing child poography, one count of receiving child poography, and two counts of possessing child poography. In addition to peer to peer file sharing, Garcia also allegedly sent and received child poography by e-mail.

• Michael Brian Perry, 37, of Pasadena, is charged in a three-count indictment that accuses him of advertising, distributing and possessing child poography.

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• Curtis Audun Larssen, 33, of Los Angeles, is charged with receipt and possession of child poography using the Ares file-sharing program.

As part of Operation Wide Net, the Los Angeles County District Attoey’s Office has charged three defendants in Los Angeles Superior Court with possession of child poography. The three state court defendants – Michael Becerra, 30, of Long Beach; Cristian Carrasco, 23, of Compton; and Andre Desire Loustau, 71, of Van Nuys – were also taken into custody Tuesday moing.

The operation also resulted in two recent arrests:

• James Breton Butler, 51, of Sherman Oaks, who has agreed to plead guilty to possession of child poography, admitting that “he possessed several hundred thousand images of child poography, as well as more than 20,000 videos of child poography” obtained through the Ares file-sharing program.

In a plea agreement filed Monday, Butler agreed to plead guilty prior to being indicted. He will make his initial appearance in federal court next month.

• David John Gastelum, 53, of Palmdale, was arrested on March 10 after being named in an indictment that charges him with two counts of receiving child poography and one count of possessing child poography using the Ares file-sharing program. Gastelum has pleaded not guilty and is scheduled to go on trial on Aug. 9.

Investigation

Operation Wide Net was conducted by the Los Angeles Inteet Crimes Against Children Task Force, which includes special agents with the Federal Bureau of Investigation, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s Homeland Security Investigations and the U.S. Postal Inspection Service, who work in conjunction with local law enforcement partners, including the Los Angeles Police Department and the Los Angeles Sheriff’s Department. The Long Beach Police Department and the Califoia Highway Patrol assisted in the operation.

“Those who trade in child poography inflict great harm on the most vulnerable in our society by re-victimizing the children in the existing poography as well as by fueling a market that requires new child victims,” said U.S. Attoey Eileen M. Decker, in a statement. “Operation Wide Net and the scores of other child exploitation cases brought every year by my office demonstrate the Department of Justice’s dual commitments to prosecuting these offenders and to preventing the further abuse of children.”

The eight federal defendants arrested today are expected to be arraigned tuesday at United States District Court in downtown Los Angeles.

The charge of advertising child poography carries a mandatory minimum sentence of 15 years in federal prison and a statutory maximum sentence of 30 years.

Distribution of child poography and receipt of child poography each carries a mandatory minimum sentence of five years in federal prison and a statutory maximum sentence of 20 years.

The charge of possession of child poography carries a statutory maximum sentence of 10 or 20 years in federal prison, depending on the nature of the images the defendant possessed.