A Bahamian citizen, Chrystano Peder Carmelo Cooper, has been sentenced to 220 months in prison for crimes related to child exploitation. The United States Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Oklahoma confirmed that Cooper, 22, was found guilty of four counts involving the production, distribution, receipt, and possession of child sexual abuse materials. Following his sentence, he will be registered as a sex offender and deported from the United States.
The investigation leading to these charges was conducted by Homeland Security Investigations. On November 14, 2024, a federal jury convicted Cooper on multiple charges related to the sexual exploitation of a minor.
Between December 2022 and February 2024, while studying in Oklahoma on an F1 student visa, Cooper coerced a minor into producing and distributing sexually explicit images online. A federal search warrant led agents to seize Cooper’s phone which contained evidence of child sexual abuse materials involving the victim.
“This sentence is proof that this defendant’s perverse behavior of sexually exploiting a child will not go unpunished,” stated Special Agent in Charge Travis Pickard from Homeland Security Investigations Dallas. He credited a Cybertip from the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children for aiding in Cooper’s incarceration.
United States Attorney Christopher J. Wilson emphasized their commitment to prosecuting those who exploit children: “The U.S. Attorney’s Office is committed to working with our law enforcement partners to aggressively prosecute those who exploit and victimize children.”
This case falls under Project Safe Childhood, an initiative by the Department of Justice aimed at combating child sexual exploitation since its inception in May 2006. The project brings together resources from various levels of government to pursue offenders and rescue victims.
Anyone with information about child exploitation is urged to contact law enforcement through several channels including NCMEC or Homeland Security Investigations.
Chief U.S. District Judge Ronald A. White presided over the sentencing hearing in Muskogee, Oklahoma. Until his transfer to a designated Bureau of Prisons facility where he will serve his non-paroleable sentence, Cooper remains under U.S. Marshals Service custody.
Assistant U.S. Attorneys Jessie K. Pippin and Jessica Bove represented the prosecution.
