Jerry Michael Moore, a registered sex offender, was caught at a Jacksonville cruise terminal with hidden camera recordings of a minor.
A U.S. District Judge sentenced 42-year-old Jerry Michael Moore of Indiana to 40 years in federal prison on Tuesday for producing and attempting to produce child sexual abuse materials. The sentence, delivered by Judge Wendy W. Berger, will be followed by a lifetime of supervised release. Moore had pleaded guilty to the charges on June 12, 2025.
The case surfaced on January 30, 2025, when Moore returned to the United States from a cruise at the Jacksonville Port Authority (JAXPORT) Cruise Terminal. Because of his 2007 Indiana conviction for sexual misconduct with a minor, U.S. Customs and Border Protection officers flagged him for a search.
During the search, officers found a cellphone in Moore’s possession. Examination of the device revealed multiple hidden video files of a minor female child stored in a secret folder within his photo gallery. Homeland Security Investigations was called in and confirmed the presence of child sexual abuse materials.
Court documents show that Moore cooperated with law enforcement, admitting he had used multiple hidden cameras, including his cellphone, to secretly record the child. He confessed to recording the child through a crawl space, capturing footage of a shower through a wall. Further review of his cellphone uncovered additional hidden recordings.
The investigation was a joint effort between U.S. Customs and Border Protection Officers and Homeland Security Investigations. Assistant U.S. Attorney Ashley Washington prosecuted the case.
Moore’s prosecution falls under Project Safe Childhood, a Department of Justice initiative launched in 2006 to combat child sexual exploitation and abuse. The program brings together federal, state, and local resources to locate, apprehend, and prosecute offenders and rescue victims.
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