Registered Sex Offender Pleads Guilty to Attempted Enticement and Child Pornography Charges

PROVIDENCE, R.I. – A registered sex offender residing in North Smithfield admitted to a federal judge on Wednesday that he posed as a 17-year-old boy and engaged in a series of explicit online communications with two young teenage boys living in Florida; that he attempted to obtain sexual explicit videos and images of the boys; that he sent them obscene videos of himself engaged in sexual activity; and that he attempted to arrange a meeting with a person whom he believed to be one of the boys to engage in illicit sexual activity, announced United States Attorney Zachary A. Cunha.

Nicholas Sannicandro, 34, charged by way of indictment pleaded two counts of attempted inducement of a minor to engage in illicit sexual activity, two counts of attempted transfer of obscene material to a minor, one count of possession and access with intent to view child pornography, and one count of commission of an offense by a registered sex offender. No plea agreement was been filed in this matter.

Sannicandro admitted that beginning in January 2021, and continuing into June 2021, he began separately communicating with two Florida minor, = boys, whom he met through an Instagram account. He admitted that he had sexually explicit communications with each of the boys. During those communications Sannicandro asked each of them to send him sexually explicit videos and image of themselves.

Additionally, during what he thought were ongoing communications with one of the boys, but were actually with an undercover officer who had taken over the boy’s account, Sannicandro invited the boy to visit him in Rhode Island; discussed sexual acts that he wanted to engage in with the boy; and twice sent him videos of himself engaged in sexual activity.

Sannicandro was arrested at a Warwick marina on June 22, 2021, where he was expecting to meet with the boy. The meeting had been arranged by the North Port, FL, undercover officer posing online as the boy and by the FBI.

Sannicandro also admitted to the court that he possessed child pornography on his phone, which was seized from him upon his arrest, and that as a result of prior convictions involving child pornography and attempted dissemination of obscene material to minors in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, he was a registered sex offender at the time he committed these crimes.

Sannicandro is scheduled to be sentenced in this latest matter on September 19, 2024. The defendant’s sentences will be determined by a federal district judge after consideration of the U.S. Sentencing Guidelines and other statutory factors.

The case is being prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorneys Denise M. Barton and John P. McAdams.

The matter was investigated by the FBI and North Port, FL, Police Department.

 United States Attorney Cunha thanks the Rhode Island State Police, members of the Rhode Island State Police Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force, and the Warwick Police Department for their assistance in the arrest of Sannicandro.

###