Griffith Man Sentenced to 210 Months in Prison

HAMMOND - Edin Galvez, 25 years old, of Griffith, Indiana, was sentenced by United States District Court Judge Gretchen S. Lund after pleading guilty to Soliciting and Enticing the Sex Trafficking of a Minor and Soliciting and Enticing the Production of Child Pornography announced United States Attorney Clifford D. Johnson.

Galvez was sentenced to 210 months on his Sex Trafficking conviction and 210 Months on his Production of Child Pornography conviction. The Court ordered these sentences to be served concurrently.

According to documents in the case, between November 2021 and May 2022, Galvez utilized a social media application to solicit a minor to engage in a sexual act for money; $2,000.00. Galvez also sought to entice and to persuade the minor to send him sexually explicit images and videos through the social media application.

"This successful prosecution shows what can be accomplished when law enforcement partners with the public to combat human trafficking and child exploitation," said United States Attorney Clifford D. Johnson. "This crime would not have been uncovered without members of the public taking a stand and alerting law enforcement to harm they are seeing in their community. We thank those community members for their courageous actions and encourage anyone who witnesses or experiences such crimes to contact law enforcement authorities directly or through the National Human Trafficking Hotline."

"The defendant's choice to leverage his position of trust as a coach, not to safeguard the minors for whom he was responsible, but to exploit them is nothing short of reprehensible," said HSI Chicago Special Agent in Charge Sean Fitzgerald. "HSI and our law enforcement partners remain steadfast in our commitment to protecting our youth and aggressively pursuing offenders who perpetrate such heinous crimes against them."

This case was investigated by Homeland Security Investigations with assistance from the Hammond Police Department and the Indiana State Police. The case was prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorney Thomas M. McGrath.