HUNTSVILLE, Ala. (WHNT) — A federal judge has sentenced a man to 20 years in prison on child exploitation charges, the Department of Justice announced on Thursday.

U.S. District Court Judge Liles C. Burke sentenced 32-year-old Myron Marroquin Lopez, a.k.a Carlos Marroquin Gomez and Carlos Marroquin Logan, to 240 months in prison, followed by a lifetime supervised release on charges of production of child pornography and transportation of a minor with intent to engage in criminal sexual activity.

Lopez, who is an undocumented person in the U.S. illegally, was found in Birmingham with a 15-year-old girl that had run away from her home in Washington, D.C.

In October 2021, a report was made to the Washington D.C. Metropolitan Police Department that the teenager had left her home.

Through combined investigative efforts between federal and local partners, the plea agreement says the girl was rescued about a week later in Alabama. Lopez, according to court documents, had taken the teen from the Metro D.C. area to Huntsville.

Investigators found videos of sexual activity between Lopez and the girl on his cell phone.

FBI Birmingham’s Child Exploitation Human Trafficking Task Force (CEHTTF), along with FBI Washington Division, U.S. Marshal’s Service Fugitive Task Force, Washington D.C. Metropolitan Police Department, and Jefferson County, Alabama, Sheriff’s Office, investigated the case.

Assistant U.S. Attorney R. Leann White prosecuted the case.

According to the DOJ, the case was brought as part of Project Safe Childhood, a nationwide initiative launched by the DOJ in May 2006 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 (CEOS), Project Safe Childhood marshals federal, state, and local resources to better locate, apprehend and prosecute individuals who exploit children via the Internet, and to identify and rescue victims. 

For more information about Project Safe Childhood, click here.