A 53-year-old man from Des Moines, Washington, identified as a registered sex offender, has been sentenced to a decade behind bars for the possession of images of child sexual abuse, a statement released by U.S. Attorney Tessa M. Gorman confirms. Edward James Creed, was discovered to have prohibited electronic devices in his possession, and his phone contained images indicative of child sexual exploitation; this led to his apprehension and subsequent sentencing by U.S. District Judge Kymberly K. Evanson, who emphasized the gravity of assisting in the perpetuation of such heinous acts against children.
The stark reality that Creed had served over ten years for a 2008 conviction for child rape in Kitsap County and was released in 2017, only to re-offend, is a chilling reminder of the complexities in preventing recidivism among sex offenders, his ‘successful’ completion of a sexual deviancy treatment program in custody becomes a point of concern considering after only short stints of freedom he was again engaging with illegal materials related to child exploitation as the recent community corrections review of his phone this March brought to light he had amassed a cache of seventy images of child sexual abuse. Assistant United States Attorney Cecelia Gregson's plea for a stiff sentence conveyed her disquiet over this pattern of deceit and Creed’s persistent efforts to bypass oversight, according to an official release by the U.S. Attorney’s Office.
The aftermath of Creed’s sentencing is the ten years he will spend confined and an ensuing 15 years of supervised release, poised to ensure vigilance and prevent further harm to society. The investigation, a collaborative effort between Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) and the Washington State Department of Corrections, represents a strong interagency approach to combating such crimes.
The case further resonates with national efforts under Project Safe Childhood, an initiative launched by the U.S. Department of Justice in 2006, striving to address the escalating crisis of child exploitation and abuse by mobilizing a spectrum of federal, state, and local operatives to locate, arrest and prosecute offenders whilst also focusing on the identification and rescue of victims; for more information on this widespread advocacy, the public can refer to their website.
