Louis Donald Mendonsa who is 62 years old and from Sacramento, assisted with managing and maintaining the websites, California man gets 24 years for running child sex abuse websites
Today, a California man was found guilty of running four websites that shared pictures of child sexual assault and was given a sentence of 24 years and 4 months in jail.
Louis Donald Mendonsa, 62, of Sacramento, helped run and manage four distinct dark web domains from at least December 2021 until his arrest in November 2022, according to court filings. These websites were all devoted to promoting, disseminating, and trading pictures and films that showed child sexual assault. Members were permitted to upload pictures and videos of infants and toddlers on one of the websites. Mendonsa promoted and shared photographs of child sexual assault on these websites while using the internet at a nearby coffee shop. She also helped others manage the websites. Law authorities inspected his electronic devices and discovered that they contained pictures of child sexual assault, almost 6,500 of which showed recognized victims of his conduct.
Mendonsa pleaded guilty in April 2024 to seven counts of distribution of child pornography and one count of possession of child pornography.
Supervisory Official Antoinette T. Bacon of the Justice Department’s Criminal Division, Acting U.S. Attorney Michele Beckwith for the Eastern District of California, and Special Agent in Charge Tatum King of Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) San Francisco made the announcement.
HSI San Francisco investigated the case, with valuable assistance provided by the Sacramento County Sheriff’s Office, the Sacramento Police Department, and the High Technology Investigative Unit of the Criminal Division’s Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section (CEOS).
CEOS Trial Attorney Kaylynn Foulon and Assistant U.S. Attorneys Emily Sauvageau and Christina McCall for the Eastern District of California prosecuted the case.
This case was brought as part of Project Safe Childhood, a nationwide initiative to combat the growing epidemic of child sexual exploitation and abuse launched in May 2006 by the Department of Justice. Led by U.S. Attorneys’ 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