FRESNO, Calif. -- United States Attorney Lawrence G. Brown announced Tuesday that Christopher Leigh, 40, of Lemoore, Calif., was sentenced Tuesday by United States District Judge Oliver W. Wanger to 97 months in custody to be followed by a 15 year term of supervised release.

Leigh pleaded guilty to receipt of child pornography on August 17, 2009.

The case was the product of an extensive investigation by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) Office in Fresno, with assistance from the Fresno County Sheriff's Department.

According to Assistant United States Attorneys Sheila K. Oberto and Brian Enos who prosecuted the case, Leigh came to the attention of law enforcement after ICE agents discovered that Leigh had obtained movie files depicting the sexual exploitation of minors for file-sharing via the peer-to-peer file sharing program.

Peer-to-peer software programs permit computer users connected to the Internet to link computers around the world for the purpose of sharing files.

Such programs can also be used to search for and download child pornography.

Following the execution of a search warrant, law enforcement officers found numerous videos of child pornography on the computer hard drive that included images of minors engaged in sadistic or masochistic conduct.

People who download and possess child pornography are truly putting the world’s youth at risk,” said Brian Poulsen, resident agent in charge of the ICE Office of Investigations in Fresno. “The images possessed by the defendant in this case included scenes involving real children who were being sexually abused and exploited in horrific ways.

ICE will continue to work closely with its law enforcement partners to target those who commit these types of crimes and see that they are brought to justice.”

In sentencing Leigh, Judge Wanger stated that these crimes involve actual victims. Judge Wanger noted that the sexual exploitation of minors would not occur unless there is a market for that conduct, and that persons like Leigh create a market for, and help perpetrate, this type of conduct.

Judge Wanger awarded the sum of $2,500 in restitution to one of the victims in the case.

The case was brought as part of Project Safe Childhood (PSC), a nationwide initiative to combat the growing epidemic of child sexual exploitation and abuse launched in May 2006 by the Department of Justice. Led by United States Attorneys’ Offices and the Criminal Division’s Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section, PSC marshals federal, state, and local resources to locate, apprehend, and prosecute individuals who exploit children via the Internet, as well as to identify and rescue victims. For more information, visit www.projectsafechildhood.gov or call the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of California and ask to speak with the PSC coordinator.