Jose Alejandro Belmonte Cardozo, Child Exploitation, Virginia 2024

A 31-year-old Lorton man has been sentenced to 18 years behind bars for exploiting minor girls on Snapchat.

Jose Alejandro Belmonte Cardozo was found guilty of using the popular social media app to find and entice minor girls as young as nine years old to create and send him sexually explicit images and videos.

Between May 1, 2021, and May 8, 2024, Belmonte Cardozo used multiple Snapchat accounts to catfish and deceive the minors into sending him child sexual abuse material (CSAM).

Prosecutors said Belmonte Cardozo convinced two 15-year-old girls that he was a teenage boy, sending them pictures of a 16-year-old boy and persuading them to send him CSAM. He also used a second account to convince other minors to send him CSAM in exchange for admission to a phony group chat.

Belmonte Cardozo amassed over 1,000 images and videos of children engaged in sexually explicit conduct on five different electronic devices. On May 8, 2024, he transported two cellphones containing approximately 600 sexually explicit images and videos of minors into the United States at Dulles International Airport.

U.S. Attorney Erik S. Siebert and Acting Special Agent in Charge of Immigration and Customs Enforcement Homeland Security Investigations (ICE HSI) Christopher Heck made the announcement after sentencing by U.S. District Judge Leonie M. Brinkema.

Belmonte Cardozo was sentenced to 18 years in prison for his crimes. The case was brought as part of Project Safe Childhood, a nationwide initiative launched in May 2006 by the Department of Justice to combat the growing epidemic of child sexual exploitation and abuse.

Belmonte Cardozo’s exact criminal charges were not specified in the press release, but it is clear that he was convicted of multiple counts of child exploitation and possession of child pornography. The exact date of his sentencing was not specified, but it occurred on an unspecified date in 2024.

The case was prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorneys Lauren Halper and Zoe Bedell. U.S. Customs and Border Protection assisted in the investigation.

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