United States Department of Justice

United States Attorney Scott N. Schools
Northern District of California

SAN JOSE – United States Attorney Scott N. Schools announced that Mark Charles Zelinsky pleaded guilty on Monday to possessing images of child pornography on a government computer. Mr. Zelinsky, 56, of San Bruno, California, was indicted on September 26, 2007. He was charged with one count of possessing images of child pornography on his government computer.

In August of 2005, Zelinsky was employed as an engineer at the NASA Ames Research Center (ARC) in Moffett Field, California. Zelinsky no longer works at the NASA-ARC Center. In pleading guilty, Zelinsky admitted that while employed at NASA, he used his NASA government computer to download from the Internet visual depictions of minors engaged in sexually explicit conduct. Zelinsky admitted to possessing over 600 images of child pornography, including images of prepubescent minors. Zelinsky is scheduled to be sentenced on March 24, 2008 before Judge James Ware in San Jose. The maximum statutory penalty for possession of child pornography under Title 18, United States Code, Section 2252(a)(4)(B) is ten years imprisonment and a fine of $ 250,000. Sentence will be imposed by the district court only after consideration of the U.S. Sentencing Guidelines and the federal statute governing the imposition of a sentence, Title 18, United States Code, Section 3553.

This investigation and prosecution are part of the Justice Department’s Project Safe Childhood, a national initiative launched last year by the U.S. Department of Justice aimed at combining federal, state, and local law enforcement resources to combat the proliferation of technology-facilitated sexual exploitation crimes against children. The threat of sexual predators soliciting children for physical sexual contact is well-known and serious; the danger of the production, distribution, and possession of child pornography is equally dramatic and disturbing. The Justice Department’s Project Safe Childhood is a coordinated and comprehensive response to these growing problems.

Joseph Fazioli is the Assistant U.S. Attorney who is prosecuting the case with the assistance of Susan Kreider. This prosecution is a result of an investigation by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration - Office of the Inspector General.

Further Information:             

Case #: CR 07-00614 JW

A copy of this press release may be found on the U.S. Attorney’s Office’s website at www.usdoj.gov/usao/can.

Electronic court filings and further procedural and docket information are available at https://ecf.cand.uscourts.gov/cgi-bin/login.pl.

Judges’ calendars with schedules for upcoming court hearings can be viewed on the court’s website at www.cand.uscourts.gov.

All press inquiries to the U.S. Attorney’s Office should be directed to Joshua Eaton at (415) 436-6958 or by email at Josh.Eaton@usdoj.gov.