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Manuel Geovanny Torres Rivas, age 27, of Hempstead on Long Island, was sentenced to 25 years behind bars Friday, Oct. 14, in federal court in Central Islip.
The sentence followed his January 2022 guilty plea to sexual exploitation of a child.
Federal investigators began looking into Torres Rivas after a 13-year-old Connecticut girl told her school that a user on the social networking app Snapchat had sent her sexually explicit conversations and unsolicited videos and images of child pornography.
The school then contacted local police, as did an 11-year-old girl in Nevada who said she had received similar content, according to the US Attorney’s Office in the Eastern District of New York.
Working in tandem with Snapchat, investigators determined that Torres Rivas had uploaded approximately 28 videos and images containing child pornography from multiple accounts.
The snapchat accounts were then traced to his Hempstead home, where police found evidence that he had videotaped several sexual encounters with a 9-year-old girl who had been entrusted in his care, prosecutors said.
Investigators said Torres Rivas targeted numerous female victims on Snapchat.
In September 2019, he told the Connecticut teen how he had sexually abused the 9-year-old girl, and sent her a video depicting a child between 8 and 10 years old engaging in sexual conduct, according to prosecutors.
In June 2020, he uploaded more than two dozen illegal images and videos, some showing children believed to be under the age of five.
“Today’s sentence removes a dangerous predator and is only possible due to the bravery of two young girls, who came forward to the authorities about the defendant’s disturbing behavior online, which then helped protect the community and end the abuse of another girl,” US Attorney Breon Peace said.
“I urge parents and caregivers to encourage their children to tell a trusted adult if anyone asks them to engage in inappropriate behavior. Protecting children and holding those who harm vulnerable victims accountable for their actions will always be priorities of our Office.”
In addition to his time behind bars, Torres Rivas must also register as a sex offender when he is released from prison, and will not be allowed to have unsupervised contact with minors.
The case was prosecuted as part of the Department of Justice’s Project Safe Childhood, a coordinated effort between local, state, and federal agencies to track down individuals who exploit children using the internet.
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