ROCKFORD, Ill. — A Rockford man has been sentenced to six and a half years in federal prison for possession of child sex abuse material following a Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) Chicago investigation.
Gregorio Bacino, 27, admitted in a plea agreement that in 2021 he knowingly possessed on his cellphone over 1,000 images and videos of minors, including those as young as infants, engaged in sexually explicit conduct.
“Each image is a crime scene, leaving lasting scars on innocent victims,” said HSI Chicago Special Agent in Charge Sean Fitzgerald. “Together, law enforcement agencies and society must relentlessly pursue these perpetrators, ensuring they face justice for the harm they cause.”
On July 19, U.S. District Court Judge Iain D. Johnston sentenced Bacino to six and a half years in federal prison, to be followed by 25 years of court-supervised release. Bacino also must register as a sex offender.
The sentence was announced by Fitzgerald and acting U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Illinois Morris Pasqual. The government was represented by Assistant U.S. Attorney Robert S. Ladd.
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 the U.S. attorneys' offices and the Criminal Division's Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section, Project Safe Childhood marshals federal, state and local resources to locate, apprehend and prosecute individuals who sexually exploit children, and to identify and rescue victims.
Together with partners in law enforcement, state and local government, international counterparts, and nongovernmental organizations, the HSI workforce does heroic work to prevent these crimes, support those who are impacted by them, and hold perpetrators accountable.
HSI offers multiple options for virtual and in-person trainings to educate the public about the growing threats children and teens face online.
Learn more about HSI Chicago’s mission to eradicate online child exploitation on X, formerly known as Twitter, at @HSIChicago.
About HSI
HSI is the principal investigative arm of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), responsible for investigating transnational crime and threats, specifically those criminal organizations that exploit the global infrastructure through which international trade, travel and finance move. HSI’s workforce consists of over 10,000 employees, assigned to 235 offices within the United States and 93 overseas locations in 56 countries. HSI's international presence represents DHS’s largest investigative law enforcement presence abroad and one of the largest international footprints in U.S. law enforcement.