A McAllen man has been handed a 10-year prison sentence after pleading guilty to charges related to his possession and distribution of child pornography, according to a recent announcement by U.S. Attorney Alamdar S. Hamdani. Gabriel Alejandro Morales, aged 27, admitted to using a third-party messaging app on his phone to both receive and distribute illicit content.
Chief U.S. District Judge Crane issued the sentence which also includes a $3,000 restitution payment to a known victim and a subsequent five-year term of supervised release. During this time, Morales' activities will be under stringent scrutiny, particularly with regard to his access to children and the internet, and he will be mandated to register as a sex offender. The Department of Justice reports that there was additional evidence indicating Morales also distributed child pornography.
Morales' crimes were initially discovered in January 2022 after authorities identified a group chat involved in sharing child pornography on an unnamed messaging service. During the investigation, approximately nine videos containing child pornography were tied to Morales' activities. In total, authorities found Morales to be connected to 77 video files of child sex abuse material, adding up to an additional 52 video files and 11 images containing similar content, as detailed by the Department of Justice.
The investigation, which was led by the FBI, revealed that the content shared by Morales included the depiction of prepubescent children in sadistic/masochistic conditions. The FBI, aided by Assistant U.S. Attorneys Cahal P. McColgan and Alexa D. Parcell, conducted the legal proceedings which resulted in the decade-long sentence. This case falls under the purview of Project Safe Childhood (PSC), a national initiative launched by the Department of Justice in 2006 to combat the growing epidemic of child sexual exploitation and abuse. Educations on internet safety are also available to the public via the DOJ’s PSC page.
Morales is currently in custody and awaiting transfer to a federal prison where he will serve out his sentence. Details on the facility and the date of the transfer have not been disclosed.
