BOISE -- A Boise man accused of attempting to prostitute a toddler on Craigslist is now facing 23 federal charges after a grand jury indicted him this week.
The U.S. Attorney's Office says 40-year-old Jason Lloyd Schaber is accused of offering a 3-year-old for sex on Craigslist. For that allegation, Schaber is now charged with using the Internet to aid in sex trafficking of a child.
He's also facing 22 charges related to producing, distributing and possessing child pornography between 2010 and 2012. Prosecutors say Schaber produced images and videos of minors engaged in sexually explicit conduct and distributed child pornography to 16 other people using email.
Schaber was arrested and charged at the state level last spring. Now, with a federal grand jury indicting Schaber, Ada County dropped those initial charges. The U.S. Attorney says this type of action isn't unusual because federal charges in exploitation cases carry heavier sentencing options, if convicted.
U.S. Attorney Wendy Olson says child sex trafficking and exploitation cases are a top priority for her office. Since 2006 when the Department of Justice began the Project Safe Childhood initiative, Olson says prosecution of these types of crimes has increased fivefold locally.
Nationwide, and in Idaho certainly, we're seeing increasing use of the Internet to advertise or to identify anyone who's going to be involved in the sex trade, and certainly the child sex trade is an active part of that. And now citizens are more attentive to that, and law enforcement is certainly more attentive to that, Olson said.
In this case, court documents show the Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force began investigating Schaber after a citizen saw the ad on Criagslist and contacted Boise Police.
Police records show the toddler victim involved in this case was living in Schaber's home at the time. As of now, prosecutors say the child is in foster care.
Schaber has been in jail since he was arrested last May and will appear in federal court in Boise on Tuesday. If convicted, Schaber faces up to a total of 485 years in prison for the 23 charges combined.
