Miami ICE Chief Accused of Transporting and Receiving Child Pornography

Anthony Mangione, 50, was arrested Tuesday and charged Wednesday with child pornography offenses after agents allegedly found images of minors engaging in sexual conduct on his computer.

The suspended chief of the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement office in Miami is accused of transporting and receiving sexually explicit images between March 2010 and September 2010. Mangione supposedly possessed electronically stored messages containing additional images of child porn during the same time frame.

The Miami ICE office works towards combatting child porn.

According to the Rueters, Mangione has been on paid administrative leave since April. The suspension occurred after federal agents seized the man’s home computer.

His Internet provider allegedly alerted a national nonprofit center about the images sent to Mangione. One of the provider’s jobs is to monitor the distribution of child porn by its users.

Officials from ICE, the FBI and the Justice Department in Washington and Miami have yet to release any details about the case against the senior federal agent.

Mangione faces a mandatory minimum sentence of five years in prison and a maximum sentence of 20 years if convicted of transportation of child porn. If convicted of receiving child porn, he faces a minimum of five years and a maximum of 20 years behind bars. Undoubtedly, Mangione’s position with ICE will impact the outcome of his case. It will be interesting to see what strategies the prosecution chooses to implement and what steps the defense will take in hopes of coming out on top.

Defending child porn cases can be incredibly challenging and complex, which is why it is imperative that an experienced criminal defense attorney and a computer forensic expert join forces and work as a team. All child porn cases have unique aspects, but most cases involve three central questions: Was the search of the computer legal? Was the accused aware of the child porn on his or her computer? And finally, were the images recovered actually child pornography? The answers to these questions lie in the hands of a sex crimes defense lawyer and an experienced digital computer forensics expert.

An experienced lawyer will take the adequate steps towards piecing together the best defense for your situation, which includes requesting a bit-by-bit forensic image of the hard drive so that it can be thoroughly examined by computer experts. These experts can review data from the hard-drive that may have been deleted and examine all file properties to create a timeline that can show when any child pornography was downloaded and when these images were accessed last. This information can show whether someone else could have played a part in accessing the images and be used as a successful defense.

Child pornography is any image that features a minor in a compromising position. Federal child porn laws regarding the production, possession, receipt, mailing, sale, distribution, shipment or transportation of child porn are quite strict and any violation of these laws is punishable by a minimum of five years in prison. In addition to prison time, further consequences can include mandatory sex offender registration, asset forfeiture and fines.

If you are suspected of or charged with crimes dealing with child pornography anywhere in the state of Florida, contact the Florida Sex Crimes Defense Attorneys at Whittel & Melton online or call our Miami office statewide and toll-free at 866-608-5529.