Source: US FBI
GREENEVILLE, Tenn. – On July 1, 2025, Patrick E. McAneny Jr, 28, of Rutledge, Tennessee, was sentenced to 292 months imprisonment by the Honorable Clifton L. Corker, United States District Judge, in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Tennessee at Greeneville. Upon his release from prison, McAneny will be on supervised release for 20 years. He will be required to register with state sex offender registries and comply with special sex offender conditions during his supervised release.
As part of the plea agreement filed with the court, McAneny plead guilty to count one of an indictment charging him with use of a minor to engage in sexually explicit conduct for the purpose of producing a visual depiction of such conduct in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 2251(a).
According to the written plea agreement filed with the court, McAneny began an online relationship with a 12-year-old girl. On February 4, 2024, McAneny traveled from his home in Grainger County, Tennessee to pick up the minor from her home in Hamblen County, Tennessee. She did not have permission to leave her home. Her family reported her missing the same day. From February 4 to February 6, 2024, while at McAneny’s home he took photos, and video recorded the minor and himself engaged in sexual acts. McAneny sent a video of the minor victim engaged in sexual acts with him to a third party online. The person contacted law enforcement upon receipt of the video. Based on the call law enforcement was able to locate the 12-year-old girl at McAneny’s home.
U.S. Attorney Francis M. Hamilton III, of the Eastern District of Tennessee, and Special Agent in Charge Joe Carrico, of the FBI Nashville Field Office, made the announcement.
The criminal indictment was the result of an investigation by the Federal Bureau of Investigations, the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation and the Hamblen and Grainger County Sheriff’s Office.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Meghan L. Gomez represented the United States at the sentencing.
This case was brought as part of Project Safe Childhood (PSC), a nationwide initiative launched in May 2006, by the Department of Justice to combat the growing epidemic of child sexual exploitation and abuse. Led by the United States Attorney’s Offices and the Criminal Division’s Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section, PSC marshals federal, state, and local resources to locate, apprehend, and prosecute individuals who sexually exploit children, and to identify and rescue victims. For more information about PSC, please visit www.justice.gov/psc.
For more information about internet safety education, please visit www.justice.gov/psc/resources.html and click on the tab “resources.”
###