A Springfield, Virginia, man was sentenced today to 150 months in prison followed by 20 years of supervised release for the attempted coercion and enticement of a minor and distribution of child pornography.
Assistant Attorney General Brian A. Benczkowski of the Justice Department’s Criminal Division, U.S. Attorney G. Zachary Terwilliger of the Eastern District of Virginia, Assistant Director in Charge Timothy R. Slater of the FBI’s Washington Field Office and Fairfax County Chief of Police Colonel Edwin C. Roessler Jr. made the announcement.
Monis Irfan, 21, a former substitute teacher and third-grade instructional assistant at two Fairfax County elementary schools, was sentenced today by U.S. District Judge Anthony J. Trenga of the Eastern District of Virginia. Irfan previously pleaded guilty on July 19, 2019.
According to admissions that he made in connection with his guilty plea, in January 2019, Irfan began communicating online with an undercover Fairfax County police detective posing as the father of a seven-year-old child. Irfan repeatedly told the detective that he was sexually interested in and active with children, and discussed his desire to perform graphic sexual acts on the detective’s fictitious child. After several days of sending sexually explicit messages and images, Irfan drove to a predetermined location to meet the undercover detective and engage in sexual acts with the child. Irfan was arrested at that time. Additional investigation revealed that Irfan received and distributed child pornography videos depicting the sexual abuse of an infant over encrypted messaging apps on his mobile phone and also used his phone to record a video of himself engaging in sexually inappropriate behavior with a five-year-old child.
The FBI Washington Field Office’s Child Exploitation and Human Trafficking Task Force and the Fairfax County Police Department investigated the case. Trial Attorney William G. Clayman of the Criminal Division’s Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section (CEOS) and Assistant U.S. Attorney Maya D. Song of the Eastern District of Virginia are prosecuting the case.
This case was brought as part of Project Safe Childhood, a nationwide initiative launched in May 2006 by the Department of Justice to combat the growing epidemic of child sexual exploitation and abuse. Led by U.S. Attorney’s Offices and CEOS, Project Safe Childhood marshals federal, state, and local resources to better locate, apprehend, and prosecute individuals who exploit children via the internet, as well as to identify and rescue victims. For more information about Project Safe Childhood, please visit www.justice.gov/psc.
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