Revealed: The double life of the law man who led the fight against child pornography while collecting 150 images of 'extreme child abuse' on his home computer
By Peter Rugg|
South Florida's former chief of U.S. Immigrations and Customs Enforcement has been sentenced to almost six years in prison on a child pornography charge.
Anthony Mangione, 52, offered sorrow but no explanation of his behavior when speaking to U.S. District Judge Kenneth Marra.
'I'm pretty much a broken guy,' he told him. 'I feel like I'm in a hole eight feet deep with six feet of dirt on top.'
Hidden: Even as he chased down child
pornographers for the federal government Anthony Mangione was building
his own collection of perverse images
Mangione ran ICE's South Florida office from 20007 to 2011, a job that included numerous child porn investigations and oversaw 450 federal employees.
He even spoke out against child pornographers.
'ICE relentlessly pursues predators who sexually abuse children, whether that abuse is physical or whether it is accomplished by exploiting their images,' he said after the 2009 sentencing of a Wellington man for enticing boys online to take off their clothes.
He was a respected, 27-year veteran of law enforcement when he retired shortly after April 2011, when investigators searched his home and office computers.
Up to 150 images of child porn, some depicting 'extreme abuse of children', were found in his position, according to federal prosecutors.
No one knew: Mangione was once the head of
Immigration and Customs Enforcement in South Florida, overseeing child
pornography investigations on a regular basis
His double life was first discovered when federal agents busted a former school bus driver in Delaware.
When that suspect's computer was searched for child pornography, some of the 700 pieces authorities found could be traced back to Mangione.
When authorities executed search warrants on Mangione's computers many of his colleagues believed it was a mistake, that he'd been examining an ongoing case on his work computer.
'As a longtime agent, you want to believe that he couldn't do this kind of thing, especially given what we do as defenders and protectors of victims of child pornography and human trafficking,' Kevin Love, a former senior special agent in ICE's Miami office, told the Sun-Sentinel. "We're the ones who arrest people for that."
Love was also confused at how easily he fell into traps he knew were there to catch criminals like him.
'He had to be aware of that, which befuddles you even more and makes you wonder if it really is a sickness. He knows all the tools of our trade,' said Love