Crime

St. Croix Man Who Admitted to Downloading 'Thousands' of Child Pornography Images and Videos Sentenced to 76 Months Imprisonment

ST. THOMAS — United States Attorney Gretchen C.F. Shappert announced today that Judge Robert Molloy sentenced Collin Gomes, 27, of St. Croix, to 78 months in prison for possession of child pornography and five years of supervised release. Gomes was also ordered to pay special assessments in the amounts of $100 and $5,000, respectively. The court also ordered $3,000 restitution to each of the three victims. According to court documents, on or about August 16, 2018, September 6, 2018 and October 22, 2018, a Grand Prairie, Texas police detective was conducting an online investigation on the BitTorrent network for offenders sharing child pornography. BitTorrent is a communication system for peer-to-peer file sharing that enables users to distribute data and electronic files over the Internet in a decentralized manner. Files are shared on the BitTorrent network via use of “torrents,” which provide addresses identifying computers that can send portions of a requested file. With the ...