Lubbock Man Sentenced to Life in Prison for Sexual Exploitation of a 10 year old Child

A man who sexually abused a child for over two years was sentenced to life in federal prison, announced Acting U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Texas Chad E. Meacham.

Alec Mendoza, 26, of Lubbock, Texas, was indicted in May 2024. He pleaded guilty in August 2024 to enticement of a minor and was sentenced Friday by U.S. District Judge James Wesley Hendrix.

According to court documents, Mendoza first met the victim, "Jane Doe" and Doe's mother at a party in 2020 when Doe was 10 years old, and Mendoza was 22 years old. Mendoza began messaging Doe online and on Valentine's Day 2021, Mendoza began sexually abusing Doe. At the time, Doe was 11 years old, and Mendoza was 23 years old.

Soon after Mendoza began abusing Doe, Mendoza moved into Doe's family home. For the next two and a half years, Mendoza had sexual intercourse with Doe approximately 30-50 times. Mendoza would also send messages to Doe discussing sex and would remind Doe to delete her messages.

In December 2023, Mendoza was caught sending text messages to Doe in the middle of the night from his bedroom down the hall. Doe's mother confronted Mendoza about the messages and Mendoza admitted to having an ongoing sexual relationship with Doe.

At sentencing, the government noted that following his conviction, Mendoza agreed to take a polygraph examination. Mendoza failed the polygraph. In his post-polygraph interview, Mendoza confessed to also sexually abusing a second child. A search warrant of Mendoza's phone also revealed Mendoza to be in possession of 20 videos of child sexual abuse material (CSAM). Mendoza admitted to law enforcement to receiving and distributing CSAM over the Internet.

At sentencing, Judge Hendrix told Mendoza that he could not "capture with words the trauma you caused that will last for lifetimes." In imposing a life sentence, Judge Hendrix said: "I have to make a lot of difficult decisions. This is not one of them."

The Federal Bureau of Investigation along with the Lubbock Police Department conducted the investigation. Assistant U.S. Attorney Stephen Rancourt prosecuted the case.