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An Indianapolis man faces 17.5 years in federal prison after being sentenced for sexual crimes against children, the U.S. Attorney’s Office of Indiana’s Southern District announced Thursday.
U.S. District Judge Matthew Brookman sentenced Melvin Anderson, 23, of Indianapolis, after he pleaded guilty to advertising child sexual abuse material and distribution of visual depictions of minors engaged in sexually explicit conduct.
Anderson was also sentenced to 10 years of supervised release following his prison term.
According to court documents, between December 2022 and March 2023, Anderson used the social media platform Twitter, now known as X, to advertise and sell child sexual abuse material.
Anderson ran multiple, publicly accessible accounts that advertised links to cloud-based storage folders containing more than 600 videos and images of minors, including individuals under 12 years of age, being sexually abused and molested.
Many of Anderson’s advertisements themselves contained thumbnails of sexually explicit images, and he often provided his own CashApp and Apple Pay account names so that his customers could send him money.
Most links were priced between $10 to $25 per link.
Anderson advertised as if he was running a legitimate retail business.
He organized the files based on various characteristics, such as the age of the minor victims, and he based the price on what he was offering. Material with younger victims garnered a higher price. He also created videos showing himself scrolling through the folders containing child sexual abuse materials in order to give his customers a preview.
“This predator not only revictimized children by exploiting the worst days of their lives over and over again to further demand, but did so just to make a quick buck,” said John Childress, Acting U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Indiana, in a news release. “If not for the work of the Secret Service and our AUSAs, this dangerous man would still be profiting from such horrific abuse and incentivizing others to exploit and harm children.”
The U.S. Secret Service investigated this case.
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