Charles Mark McCormack, 54, of Muscle Shoals was sentenced Tuesday to 10 years in prison, to be followed by three years of supervised release, for producing child pornography between 1997 and 1998.
Acting Assistant Attorney General John Cronan of the Justice Department’s Criminal Division and U.S. Attorney Jay E. Town of the Northern District of Alabama announced the sentence. McCormack, pleaded guilty on Nov. 27, 2017, to one count of production of child pornography before Chief U.S. District Judge Karon Bowdre of the Northern District of Alabama.
McCormack admitted in his guilty plea, that between Aug. 1, 1997, and Oct. 15, 1998, he used an approximately 6-year-old girl to engage in sexually explicit conduct for the purpose of producing visual depictions of the conduct, by videotaping the girl urinating in a bathroom in his Colbert County, Alabama, residence.
When authorities searched McCormack’s residence, law they found images of nude and topless females believed to constitute child pornography and a suitcase containing young girls’ panties. McCormack was employed as a kindergarten teacher at the time of the search.
The U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s Homeland Security Investigations is investigating this case with support from the Georgia Bureau of Investigation. Trial Attorney William M. Grady of the Criminal Division’s Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section (CEOS) and Assistant U.S. Attorney Chinelo Dike-Minor of the Northern District of Alabama are prosecuting the case.
This investigation is a part of Project Safe Childhood, a nationwide initiative to combat the growing epidemic of child sexual exploitation and abuse launched in May 2006 by the Department of Justice. Led by U.S. Attorneys’ Offices and CEOS, Project Safe Childhood marshals federal, state, and local resources to better locate, apprehend, and prosecute individuals who exploit children via the Internet, as well as to identify and rescue victims.
McCormack taught kindergarten in Walker County’s Chattanooga Valley Elementary School. There he allegedly put his phone between a young girl’s knees and took an inappropriate upskirt photo. Those allegations by the Walker County child led to the police raid on his home. As part of the plea agreement, federal prosecutors promised not to pursue any charges for possession of child pornography on his cellphone or computer. McCormack denies ever inappropriately touching a child.
He previously lived in the state of Georgia.
