Convicted sex offender sentenced to 11 years for child porn on cell phone

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – A previously convicted sex offender was sentenced Monday to 139 months in federal prison and 15 years of supervised release on a federal child pornography charge. This sentence resulted from an investigation by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement's (ICE) Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) and the U.S. Probation Office.

According to court documents, on March 8, two U.S. probation officers went to the Jacksonville residence of Scott Brandon Heath, 35, for a routine home inspection. Heath was previously convicted of transportation of child pornography on Jan. 27, 2005, and was sentenced to 78 months in federal prison, followed by three years of supervised release. He was released from prison on Sept. 23, 2010, to begin his term of supervised release.

Once inside the residence, officers noticed a video game controller lying on Heath's bedroom floor. When Heath showed the officers his video game console inside a dresser drawer, a cell phone inside the drawer was also visible. Heath admitted that he had accessed the Internet using this cell phone around six times. In doing so, he violated the terms of his supervised release. The officers took custody of Heath's cell phone and a subsequent forensic analysis revealed that it contained 5,147 images of minors engaged in sexually explicit conduct.

This investigation was part of Operation Predator, a nationwide HSI initiative to protect children from sexual predators, including those who travel overseas for sex with minors, Internet child pornographers, criminal alien sex offenders and child sex traffickers. HSI encourages the public to report suspected child predators and any suspicious activity through its toll-free hotline at 1-866-DHS-2-ICE or its online tip form. Both are staffed around the clock by investigators.

Suspected child sexual exploitation or missing children may be reported to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, an Operation Predator partner, at 1-800-843-5678 or http://www.cybertipline.com.