27 years imprisonment to the owner of the biggest sexual site for the exploitation of children…

A US court has convicted a defendant, described as “the owner of the world’s largest sexual exploitation site” and sentenced him to 27 years in prison.

It was the Irish authorities who identified Erik Owen Marquez, owner of Freedom Hosting, after a hacking software had been used to hack into his personal computer.

Marquez, 36 years old, created and operated computer servers on the dark web that enabled users to anonymously access millions of illegal photos and videos, some of them related to the rape and torture of infants and young children.

The judge, Theodore Chuang, considered that Marquez’s actions amounted to the crimes of a drug dealer, adding: “His actions were utterly despicable.”

Before his sentencing, Marquez had apologized to the victims for his crimes, asking forgiveness from the court, before adding, “My reputation and that of my family have been ruined.. Please give me a second chance.”

One lawyer said that no one in the courtroom would accept what his client had done. “But he regrets what he did, and he will not do it again.”

Justice Ministry prosecutor Ralph Paradiso said that Marquez had created “an online community of sexual harassers to abuse and exploit children and share horrific images”.

He continued: “They all came together to sexually exploit children.. “They were happy with their acts.”

“The judge agreed to count the eight years he has spent in detention in both Ireland and the United States since his arrest in 2013, but fined him $87,000 for the victims of the child abuse photos he helped publish.”

In February 2020, Marquez pleaded guilty to establishing and operating the dark web Freedom Hosting between 2008 and 2013, and investigators found more than 8.5 million images and videos of child sexual abuse,

Marquez was living in Ireland at the time of the crimes but was extradited to Maryland authorities in March 2019.