HOLLYWOOD MAN SENTENCED TO 240 MONTHS IN PRISON FOR POSSESSION OF CHILD PORNOGRAPHY

R. Alexander Acosta, United States Attorney for the Southern District of Florida, and Jonathan I. Solomon, Special Agent in Charge, Federal Bureau of Investigation, announced today that Raymond George Bohning, 60, of Hollywood, Florida was sentenced today to 240 months' imprisonment, to be followed by a supervised release term of life. The sentence imposed was based on the defendant's conviction on charges of enticing a minor to engage in sexual activity, production of images of a child engaging in sexually explicit conduct, distribution of child pornography to a minor to persuade her to engage in sexual conduct, and possession of child pornography.

According to court records, in November of 2003, Bohning traveled from Florida to Birmingham, England, to meet with two girls, a 13 and 15 year old, to engage in sexual conduct. The father of the 13 year-old girl intercepted a telephone call between Bohning and his daughter in which Bohning discussed his planned sexual encounter with her. The young girl's father contacted British law enforcement, which in turn notified the Federal Bureau of Investigation in Miami, Florida. Bohning was arrested in the United Kingdom and charged with various offenses, including possessing and distributing indecent images of minors. A subsequent search of his person and hotel room revealed that he was in possession of a laptop computer, Viagra pills, Vaseline, a teenager pornography magazine, and Polaroid images of a teenager engaging in sexually explicit conduct. Bohning plead guilty in the United Kingdom to possessing and distributing indecent images and publishing an indecent article. He was sentenced to 2 ½ years imprisonment. He was subsequently extradited to the United States for prosecution.

A separate investigation conducted by the Federal Bureau of Investigation revealed that Bohning had an extensive collection of child pornography depicting minors being sexually abused, including babies and toddlers. In addition, the investigation revealed that he induced the production of images depicting a 15 year-old girl in Pennsylvania engaging in sexually explicit conduct and that he had distributed images to a minor in an effort to persuade her to engage in sexually activity with him. Bohning had accumulated a word typed document list of 374 individual Internet "screen" or "user" names, the majority of which were minors, in which he described his knowledge of their physical attributes, state or country of residence and their sexual experiences.
Mr. Acosta commended the investigative efforts of the Federal Bureau of Investigation - Miami Field Office, and the West Midlands Police Department in the United Kingdom. The analysis of the computer forensic evidence was accomplished by the High Technology Investigative Unit of the United States Department of Justice's Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section. This case was prosecuted by Robin Waugh-Farretta, Assistant United States Attorney.

A copy of this press release may be found on the website of the United States Attorney's Office for the Southern District of Florida at www.usdoj.gov/usao/fls <http://www.usdoj.gov/usao/fls/>. Related court documents and information may be found on the website of the District Court for the Southern District of Florida at www.flsd.uscourts.gov <http://www.flsd.uscourts.gov/> or on <http://pacer.flsd.uscourts.gov> <http://pacer.flsd.uscourts.gov/>.