DETROIT -- A 62-year-old associate professor from Connecticut was sentenced Thursday in a Federal District Court after he flew to Detroit to have sex with a 5-year-old girl in 2007.
Judge Denise Page Hood sentenced Irving Mittleman to 13 years in federal prison after he was found guilty of enticement to commit illegal sexual activity and travel with intent to engage in illicit sexual conduct.
Mittleman was arrested on Nov. 3, 2007, at the Detroit airport after having numerous conversations with an undercover officer posing as a Detroit mother offering her 5- and 3-year-old children for sex.
Mittleman engaged in numerous online and telephone conversations with a Macomb Area Computer Enforcement Unit (MACE) for almost a month before he flew to Detroit.
He told the undercover agent, whom he believed to be the mother, that he wanted to fly to Detroit to engage in oral and sexual intercourse with her 5-year-old daughter.
"In this case, the defendant developed an online relationship with a single mother in hopes of securing access to her children that he intended to abuse," said United States Attorney Terrence Terrence G. Berg.
During the investigation, detectives learned the University of New Haven adjunct professor had an extensive collection of child pornography.
He also admitted to a sexual encounter he said he had with a 14-year-old girl and her 8-year-old sister in 2005.
“This case highlights the clear connection between the desire to collect child pornography and the actual intent to sexually abuse children," said Berg.
Berg praised the work of the FBI, the Macomb County Sheriff’s Office, and their joint task force, the Macomb Area Computer Enforcement Unit.
