A Scott man was sentenced to more than 17 years in prison this week, after he pleaded guilty to trying to get a person he thought was 13 years old to engage in criminal sexual activity.
Kane Miller, 33, was sentenced to 17 years, one month in federal prison, followed by a lifetime of supervised release.
Back in September, Miller pleaded guilty to one count of attempting to entice a minor to engage in criminal sexual activity and two counts of attempted production of child pornography of the superseding indictment filed in his case.
The charges in this case stem from an investigation by an undercover law enforcement officer wherein the officer posed as a 13-year-old female on Whisper, an anonymous social networking app. A message was posted by the undercover officer and a user, who was later identified as Miller, contacted the purported minor female utilizing the private message function on Whisper.
Between December 5, 2022 and January 4, 2023, Miller was messaging the minor female and expressed his desire to meet with the “child.” In very explicit terms, he further expressed his desire to engage in sexual acts with the “child” when they met. The defendant discussed details of meeting with the “child,” including determining that she lived in Lafayette, and confirming that he also lived in Lafayette. In addition, he sent numerous images of his private parts to the “child.”
Law enforcement officers arrested Miller on March 7, 2023. At the time of his arrest, after being advised of his Miranda rights, Miller admitted that he had not only talked to the “child” identified above, but that in addition, numerous other minor females had sent him images and he kept them on his cell phone.
Miller gave law enforcement officers consent to view his cell phone and they found numerous sexually explicit naked images of what appeared to be young adolescent children. Those images could be coupled with text messages in which the defendant had asked for the sexually explicit images and in which the children had told the defendant that they were minor females under the age of 15.
These instances occurred in February 2023, before he spoke to the undercover agent pretending to be a 13-year-old girl.
In each instance, Miller requested and obtained sexually explicit images from females identifying themselves as minor females under the age of 15. Though the children have not been identified, they appear to be minor females. As such, the defendant attempted to cause persons he believed to be minor females to produce sexually explicit images of themselves and sent to him using the internet.
The case was investigated by Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorney J. Luke Walker.
This case is part of Project Safe Childhood, a U.S. Department of Justice nationwide initiative to combat the growing epidemic of child sexual exploitation and abuse. Led by U.S. Attorneys’ Offices and the Criminal Division’s Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section, Project Safe Childhood combines 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.projectsafechildhood.gov
