Former FBI Agent Disclosed Sensitive Information About Child Sex Task Force: Feds

ROME, GA -- A former FBI special agent based in North Georgia has entered a guilty plea to disclosing confidential information about a task force operating to arrest those who sought out sexual relations with children. Kenneth W. Hillman III, 47, formerly of Dalton, entered the guilty plea on Friday in federal court in Rome.

United States Magistrate Judge Walter Johnson presided over the guilty plea hearing and will provide United States District Judge Harold L. Murphy with a recommendation. If the judge accepts the plea agreement, he will impose a sentence after reviewing a report compiled by the U.S. Probation Office.

According to the Beth Drake, the U.S. Attorney for the District of South Carolina, which was assigned prosecution of the case, Hillman was employed as a special agent in the Northern District of Georgia between Aug. 1, 2012, and Nov. 30, 2012.

The task force, which included other officers from local law enforcement agencies, was designed to investigate and solicit persons seeking to have sexual relations with children. The task force used an undercover facility, along with undercover computers, government cell phones and specialized internet chat language designed by and known only to its members to solicit and lure these individuals to the area where they were arrested.

Prosecutors contend Hillman disclosed sensitive information about the operation of the task force to two individuals. He also allowed the two subjects to "view agents involved in the internet chatting with some individuals and allowing them to accompany agents during the arrests of some of these individuals," the office added.

Hillman also allowed one of the individuals to access sensitive -- but unclassified -- undercover FBI computer and specialized chat language used by the task force. The former agent also allowed this person to use the undercover computer and specialized language to engage in several conversations with suspects on behalf of the task force. This person, the U.S. Attorney's Office states, recruited several individuals who were looking to engage sexual with minor children in the area. Those people were eventually arrested.

Hillman was not allowed to divulge any information or make known the task force's operations to those individuals or give the go-ahead for them to take part in the sting.

Beth Drake, U.S. Attorney for the District of South Carolina, states the maximum penalty is one year in prison and/or a fine of $100,000.

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