Acting US Attorney A. Lee Bentley, III announced to Historic City News today that 67-year-old Charles Lee Gorish, a registered sexual offender who once lived at 5412 Choctaw Street in St Augustine, has entered a guilty plea to transporting images and videos of child pornography from Florida to Canada.
According to court documents, Gorish, using a fake name, sent a package by FedEx from St Augustine to an individual in Ontario, Canada.
The package was intercepted by Canadian law enforcement officers. It contained, among other things, two micro SD media cards with more than 600 images and videos depicting child pornography, and thousands of images of child erotica.
Further investigation revealed that Gorish is a registered sex offender. He was convicted in Hillsborough County, Florida on February 24, 1992, for lewd and lascivious conduct against a minor child.
On September 7, 2012, FBI agents and Sheriff’s Office personnel executed a federal search warrant at Gorish’s residence in St Augustine. During an interview that followed, Gorish admitted, among other things, that he downloaded the files depicting the sexually explicit images of young boys on the SD cards from the Internet, over a period of years. Gorish was subsequently arrested.
Gorish faces a mandatory minimum penalty of not less than 15 years and up to 40 years in federal prison. Gorish has been in custody in Folkston, Georgia since his arrest in St Augustine on September 7, 2012. A sentencing hearing has not yet been set.
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