CAPE GIRARDEAU - A Southeast Missouri man on Thursday admitted recording his sexual abuse of five young girls in 2024 and 2025.

Lantz D. Crawford, 26, of Ripley County, near Doniphan, pleaded guilty in U.S. District Court in Cape Girardeau to five counts of production of child pornography. He admitted recording his sexual abuse of five girls, ages 2, 4, 5, 6 and 6, between the summer of 2024 and late 2025. In December of 2025, the mother of the 4-year-old girl contacted the Ripley County Sheriff's Office after her daughter reported the abuse. Crawford's phone was seized and investigators found child sexual abuse material (CSAM) involving young children.

Crawford faces a mandatory minimum of 15 years in prison at sentencing, scheduled for September 3. The U.S. Attorney's Office will recommend 60 years in prison.

The Ripley County Sheriff's Office, the FBI and the Missouri State Highway Patrol investigated the case. Assistant U.S. Attorney Julie Hunter is prosecuting the case.

This case was brought as part of Project Safe Childhood, a nationwide initiative to combat the growing epidemic of child sexual exploitation and abuse launched in May 2006 by the Department of Justice. Led by U.S. Attorneys' Offices and the Department of Justice Criminal Division's Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section, Project Safe Childhood marshals federal, state and local resources to better locate, apprehend and prosecute individuals who exploit children via the Internet, as well as to identify and rescue victims. For more information about Project Safe Childhood, please visit https://www.justice.gov/psc.