A former Federal Air Marshal and Border Patrol Agent from Hicksville was sentenced Monday to 90 year in federal prison for sexually abusing three boys over a four-year span a decade ago.
Michael McGowan was convicted at Central Islip federal court of attempting to receive child pornography and sexual exploitation of children.
Prosecutors said the 41-year-old was serving time for the 2005 child porn conviction when he sought from prison to have the image destroyed, which led to his conviction three years later on exploitation charges.
“His prior imprisonment did nothing to deter him from compounding his crimes by reaching out from prison in an attempt to subvert justice and destroy evidence,” said Loretta Lynch, U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of New York.
U.S. Postal Inspectors initially arrested McGowan in 2004 when he had child porn mailed to his house and a search of his computer revealed more than 1,300 images and videos of boys between the ages of 10 and 15 years old, engaged in sexual activity with other boys and men.
McGowan had claimed to have been investigating child pornography cases in his capacity as a Federal Air Marshal.
After his first conviction, he called a then-15-year-old boy from jail and engaged in a sexual conversation with the boy. The boy later told federal investigators that McGowan had abused him two years prior in Texas, where McGowan previously lived.
Judge Sandra Feuerstein had sentenced McGowan to 20 years in prison followed by lifetime supervised release on the child porn charge after the molestation came to light.
Then, while housed at a federal prison in North Carolina, McGowan wrote a letter to a then 18-year-old victim in 2008, asking him to destroy a hard drive containing child porn that McGowan had hidden behind a wall in his Hicksville home.
Bureau of Prisons personnel then interviewed the second victim, who admitted that McGowan had molested him from 10 to 14 years old before investigators seized the hidden hard drive that contained more than 1,000 images of child porn, including images of children as young as 5-years-old engaged in sexual conduct.
Also on the hard driver were photos of McGowan molesting three boys, ages 11 to 13, which were taken in hotel rooms that McGowan had access to in his work as an Air Marshal. A videotape showing a boy engaged in sexual activities filmed by McGowan was also found.
Before pleading guilty to three exploitation charges in 2011, McGowan repeatedly sent threatening letters to one of the victims depicted in the child porn that McGowan created.
Feuerstein sentenced McGowan to serve the 90 years for exploitation consecutively to the remainder of his 20-year term for child porn, totaling 110 years.
