2011 Annual Report - Virginia Attorney General

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2011 REPORT OF THE ATTORNEY GENERAL
Demand” through Comcast cable. In addition to the video, members of the Division
have provided training to over 1,000 people throughout the Commonwealth on the
subjects Gangs 101, How to Target Kids, Gangs and Virginia Law, and Gangs and
Technology.
Also in 2011, the Division spearheaded an anti-bullying effort that included a
website launch and a PSA featuring Miss Virginia. In the area of human trafficking,
the office, in partnership with the Virginia Department of Criminal Justice Services,
conducted a full-day training of prosecutors, law enforcement officers, and state
victim-witness coordinators from jurisdictions across Virginia on how to investigate
and prosecute human trafficking under Virginia law. This training was the first of its
kind in the Commonwealth.
Another first for the Division were the three community days held in 2011. In
the past, Community Days were held every 2 years. However, this past year the
office hosted 3, in Petersburg, Danville, and Richmond. Each event saw hundreds of
community members, law enforcement, area businesses, and local government
officials coming together to beautify an area park.
Computer Crime Section
In 1998, the General Assembly authorized and funded the creation of a
Computer Crime Section within the Office of the Attorney General (OAG). The
long-term vision for the Section was to spearhead Virginia’s computer-related
criminal law enforcement in the Twenty-First Century. In accordance with § 2.2-511,
the OAG has concurrent and original jurisdiction to investigate and prosecute crimes
within Virginia’s Computer Crimes Act, crimes that implicate the exploitation of
children or involve identity theft. During 2011, the Computer Crime Section
continued to travel extensively throughout the Commonwealth to investigate and
prosecute such crimes. The Section’s attorneys are cross-designated as Special
Assistant United States Attorneys and prosecute cases in federal and state courts.
Also in 2011, the OAG created a Computer Forensic Unit within the Computer Crime
Section to better leverage the office’s resources and assist in handling computer
forensics for various law enforcement agencies statewide.
The Section successfully prosecuted several notable cases in 2011. In United
States v. Hoover, undercover FBI agents detected the defendant trading child
pornography images on a peer-to-peer network. FBI agents executed a search warrant
at his Fredericksburg residence and seized computer equipment and digital media. A
subsequent forensic examination revealed thousands of child pornographic images
and movies saved on numerous hard drives. The images contained prepubescent
children engaged in sadomasochistic conduct and bestiality. The defendant was
sentenced in U.S. District Court in Richmond to 10 years active imprisonment with an
additional 8 years of supervised release on one count of distribution of child
pornography. Commonwealth v. Ludwig was tried after an officer with the Richmond
Police Department received a cyber tip from the National Center for Missing and
Exploited Children that a person had uploaded child pornography onto teenage social
networking sites. Contemporaneous to this tip, an agent with Virginia State Police
was able to download child pornography videos and images from that same IP
address. Additional investigation revealed the IP address belonged to the defendant
and agents subsequently executed a search warrant at his residence in Chesterfield. A