Jacksonville, Florida – United States Attorney Maria Chapa Lopez announced that Aaron Kirk Woolman (58, Hagerman, Idaho) has pleaded guilty to attempting to entice a 9-year-old child to engage in sexual activity and produce [censored]ographic images of herself. Woolman faces a minimum mandatory penalty of 10 years, and up to life, in federal prison. Woolman was arrested by FBI agents at his home in Idaho on December 11, 2019, and transported to Jacksonville, where he remains in custody pending sentencing.
According to court documents, on August 7, 2019, an undercover FBI agent from Jacksonville, posing as a parent of a 9-year-old child, made contact with Woolman in an online chat application. During several chat sessions, Woolman solicited the “parent” to send him [censored]ographic images of the child. Woolman also engaged in conversations via text messaging with an undercover FBI agent posing as the 9-year-old child. During these conversations, Woolman solicited the “child” to engage in sexual activity, produce explicit images of herself, and send these images to Woolman. Woolman tried to convince the “child” to comply with his requests by sending the “child” explicit images of himself and adult [censored]ography.
On December 13, 2019, FBI agents and other law enforcement personnel executed a search warrant at Woolman’s home, where he was arrested. Woolman admitted to communicating with the “dad” and the 9-year-old “girl” for a couple of weeks. He also admitted that he had sent the “girl” a picture of his penis and acknowledged that he had asked the “girl” for a picture of her in the shower, and for other explicit pictures of her.
A search of Woolman’s online cloud storage account revealed several images and videos depicting young children engaged in sexual acts with adults. Woolman’s smart phone also contained child sex abuse images. FBI agents also recovered a loaded handgun in the drawer of Woolman’s nightstand, stored together with a quantity of marijuana, baggies, and a digital scale.
This case was investigated by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (Jacksonville and Boise, Idaho), as well as the Gooding County (Idaho) Sheriff’s Office and the Twin Falls (Idaho) Police Department. It is being prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorney D. Rodney Brown.
It is another case brought as part of Project Safe Childhood, 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 Attorneys’ Offices and the Criminal Division’s Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section, Project Safe Childhood 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 Project Safe Childhood, please visit www.justice.gov/psc.
