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A middle-aged Lubbock man was sentenced today to the statutory maximum of 30 years in federal prison for producing sexually explicit images of a 14-year-old girl he picked up in Georgia, announced U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Texas Chad E. Meacham.

Robert David Fyke, 34, was arrested in June and pleaded guilty in August to production of child pornography. He was sentenced Thursday by U.S. District Judge James Wesley Hendrix.

According to plea papers and the evidence presented at sentencing, Mr. Fyke admitted he exchanged sexually explicit images with a 14-year-old child he met on Kik, a messaging app popular among teenagers.  He then traveled to Georgia in an attempt to pick her up, but was initially unsuccessful and returned home.  On May 15, he drove to Georgia a second time, picked her up, and brought her back to Lubbock.

On June 17, law enforcement tracked the child’s phone to Mr. Fyke’s Lubbock residence, but were unable to find the child or her abuser there. Eventually, they located the defendant at his place of employment, and he consented to an search of his phone and a forensic interview.

On the phone, law enforcement found sexually explicit images of the child. Mr. Fyke initially told agents he believed the girl in the photographs was 16 or 17, but later admitted he knew she was 14. He stated that the child left him for another adult male, who he believed lived in Pennsylvania or Connecticut.  Fyke admitted to producing sexually explicit images of Doe after arriving in Lubbock.

That same day, law enforcement in Connecticut recovered the child and apprehended Wayne Marcell, 35, who has been charged by the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Connecticut with sexual exploitation of the child, among other crimes. Mr. Marcell, who was charged via criminal complaint, is presumed innocent until proven guilty.

The Federal Bureau of Investigation’s Dallas Field Office – Lubbock Resident Agency and the Lubbock Police Department’s Internet Crimes Against Children Division conducted the investigation with the assistance of Homeland Security Investigations, the Texas Department of Public Safety, the Dekalb County Sheriff’s Office in Georgia, and the Danbury Police Department in  Connecticut. Assistant U.S. Attorney Stephen Rancourt is prosecuting the Northern District of Texas case against Mr. Fyke; Assistant U.S. Attorney Nancy V. Gifford is prosecuting the District of Connecticut case against Mr. Marcell.