SAN ANTONIO – A 38-year-old San Antonio man was sentenced Monday to 25 years in federal prison for production of child pornography.
After completing his prison term, Armando Robledo Gonzales will be placed under supervised release for 10 years.
Gonzales pleaded guilty to the charge in December 2018.
According to a news release from the U.S. Attorney's Office of the Western District of Texas, Gonzales admitted that, in May 2017, he persuaded a 13-year-old to produce and send him visual images and videos of the minor engaging in sexually explicit conduct.
The case was among the first investigated by the San Antonio's Child Exploitation Human Trafficking Task Force, which includes the FBI, the U.S. Attorney's Office and the Bexar County Sheriff's Office.
"We are doing everything that we can to hunt these monsters down who prey on our children on the internet, who befriend them, who recruit them," FBI Special Agent in Charge Christopher Combs said. "Between the three agencies, we have really created a heck of a team and we are prosecuting these people as quickly as we can find them."
Combs said that among the keys to the team's success is parental involvement. He urged parents to monitor closely their children's internet social activity.
"The problem of child exploitation is not just strangers, not just the boogyman. It's also people that we know," Combs said.
Bexar County Sheriff Javier Salazar issued a strong warning to predators.
"If you're victimizing children, the FBI, the Bexar County Sheriff's Office and our partners in this, we'll find you and we will ruin your day. I can promise you that," he said.
The case was brought as part of Project Safe Childhood, a nationwide initiative to combat the epidemic of child sexual exploitation and abuse launched in May 2006 by the U.S. Department of Justice.