Cobb Sex Offender Gets Prison Time for Child Porn Distribution

A Marietta man and registered sex offender will be off the streets while he serves a sentence in federal prison for receiving and distributing child pornography, the U.S. Attorney’s Office announced Tuesday.

Charles Pelts, 35, was sentenced to 15 years in prison and lifetime probation following his May 14, 2014 guilty plea, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of Georgia Atlanta Division said in a release. Following his release, Pelts must register as a sex offender. However, Pelts was already on the list at the time of his most recent arrest and conviction.

Pelts was originally convicted of aggravated child molestation in 2004 and was required to register as a sex offender following his release in 2008, according to the Georgia Bureau of Investigation. According the U.S. Attorney’s Office, the Department of Homeland Security Investigations, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (HSI) began investigating Pelts in November of 2013 after they discovered he had set up two e-mail accounts to send child pornography to others. The images included graphic sexual acts involving very young children.

HSI investigators obtained warrants for Pelts’ e-mail accounts and cell phone, and discovered 11,000 images of child pornography in his e-mail accounts and 4,050 images of child pornography on his phone. Some of the images depicted infants and toddlers. It was at this time that HSI learned of Pelts’ 2004 conviction for aggravated child molestation.

“By trafficking in graphic images of pornography depicting very young children, Pelts contributed to the horrifying child exploitation trade,” said United States Attorney Sally Quillian Yates in a statement. “We remain steadfast in partnering with federal and local law enforcement officers to vigorously prosecute those engaged in the market for child pornography.”

“The defendant’s egregious disregard for the law and his perverse desire to witness the rape of children simply have no place in our society,” said Ryan L. Spradlin, acting special agent in charge of ICE Homeland Security Investigations in Atlanta in a statement. “The victims whose abuse is so starkly recorded in collections like this know exactly what sort of sick pleasure the defendant derived from seeing the worst moments of their lives. It’s enough to make anyone’s skin crawl.”

Photo Credit: Georgia Bureau of Investigation