Highland Man Gets 5 Years for Child Porn Distribution

Neil Rothfeder, 58, of Highland, New York, is going away for five years — hard time — for peddling child pornography across digital lines he thought were safe. Sentenced today in Albany federal court, Rothfeder will serve 60 months behind bars, followed by a lifetime of supervised release, a permanent scarlet letter for a crime that leaves lasting damage far beyond prison walls.

The charges cut deep: Rothfeder admitted in a July 6, 2016 plea that he emailed child pornography to others during 2012. Not once, not twice — repeatedly — using the very technology meant to connect people as a weapon to spread abuse. Federal prosecutors didn’t mince words: this wasn’t a moment of weakness. It was deliberate. It was predatory.

United States Attorney Richard S. Hartunian and Angel M. Melendez, Special Agent in Charge of Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) in New York, announced the sentence with the cold finality of justice served. Rothfeder didn’t get leniency. He got what the law demands: prison time, parole that never ends, and a lifetime registration as a sex offender — a status that follows him everywhere, forever.

The investigation, led by HSI New York, peeled back Rothfeder’s digital trail, exposing a hidden world of illicit sharing. Email servers, IP addresses, metadata — all pointed back to him. There was no alibi. No escape. Just the raw truth: he chose to traffic in images of exploited children, and now he pays the price.

Assistant United States Attorney Katherine Kopita prosecuted the case with the weight of Project Safe Childhood behind her. That’s the nationwide crackdown on online child exploitation, stitching together federal, state, and local forces to hunt down predators hiding in the digital shadows. Rothfeder wasn’t some mastermind. He was just another name on their list — until he became a case file with a conviction stamped across it.

For more on Project Safe Childhood and how federal agents are tracking down offenders like Rothfeder, visit www.justice.gov/psc. The message is clear: send, share, or store child pornography, and the feds will come. And they won’t forget.

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