A Birmingham man will spend the next 55 years behind bars after pleading guilty to sexually exploiting a 14-year-old girl, with the admission coming only after jury selection had already begun in his federal trial. Robert Lee Ford Jr. was sentenced to 660 months in prison on two counts of sexual exploitation of a child, closing out a case that started with a mother's report to authorities nearly two years ago.
Chief U.S. District Judge Madeline H. Haikala handed down the sentence, according to WBMA. Ford had been set to face a jury, but he changed his plea to guilty on both counts after the jury selection process was already underway, the station reported.
How the Case Came to Light
The investigation traces back to a report from the girl's mother, who told authorities that Ford had assaulted her 14-year-old daughter, per the plea agreement cited by the station's report. That account set off a probe that eventually uncovered digital evidence tying Ford directly to the abuse.
Prosecutors said investigators later found videos of child sexual abuse material that Ford had produced using the girl, with the material dating to December 2024 and January 2025, the same account notes. Investigators reviewed Ford's online accounts as part of building the case against him, according to the outlet's reporting.
Investigators and Prosecutors Involved
The case was investigated by the Jefferson County Sheriff's Office and the FBI Birmingham Child Exploitation and Human Trafficking Task Force, per the same account. Assistant U.S. Attorneys R. Leann White and J. Patrick Lamb prosecuted the case, the station's report states.
The 55-year sentence lands among a string of lengthy federal terms handed down in Alabama child-exploitation cases in recent years. In a separate case, a Madison man was sentenced to 140 years in prison for child-exploitation crimes, according to the U.S. Department of Justice, Northern District of Alabama. And a Talladega man received 210 months in federal prison for distributing child sex abuse material, per the FBI.
Ford's case now stands closed with a sentence that will keep him incarcerated for decades, the result of a mother's report, a digital evidence trail, and a guilty plea that came only once a jury was already being seated to hear the case against him.
