A Hammond man was sentenced to 262 months – or nearly 22 years – Thursday for child porn.
Michael Swiger, 41, was convicted of distribution and attempted distribution of child pornography, Acting U.S. Attorney M. Scott Proctor said in a release.
U.S. District Judge Gretchen Lund oversaw the three-day trial. He is ordered to pay $49,000 in restitution.
Defense lawyer Jerry Flynn wrote in court filings that Swiger “maintained his innocence.”
According to the criminal complaint, an undercover Homeland Security agent in St. Paul, Minnesota, was posing as a 26-year-old female named “April” on the social media messaging application KIK, using the screen name “Justagirl14f.” The agent had been chatting with Swiger, who mostly used the name Michael Johns with a screen name of “Armyman121983,” since January 2022.
They discussed meeting in Roger, Minnesota, and Swiger offered to teach April to inject methamphetamine and how to buy methamphetamine on the Dark Web, court records state.
He told the agent he had sex with a 15-year-old and liked 13-year-old blonde children, documents state.
“I found an old video of my ex-gf on Omegle from when she was 12. Want that too,” he messaged the woman on the Kik app
“Up to u. She was 12? Fr,” she replied.
Documents alleged Swiger then sent a two-minute video of a 12-year-old girl in a sexual situation on April 4, 2022. He sent another one-minute clip — the last minute of the previous video — on the same day.
Hammond Police were familiar with Swiger, having previously responded to his house for an overdose.
A warrant was granted by a judge to search Swiger’s home, where law enforcement seized 7.3 grams of methamphetamine, various handguns and rifles, and several computer devices.
Post-Tribune archives contributed.
mcolias@post-trib.com
