Fugitive arrested at Miami International Airport sentenced to over 8 years in prison

MIAMI – A 54-year-old Florida fugitive who was arrested last year after his plane from Argentina landed at Miami International Airport was in a federal prison on Saturday, where he will spend more than eight years before being eligible for parole as a registered sex offender.

A Columbia County Sheriff’s Office detective serving as an FBI task force officer caught Octavio A. Robledo online in 2017 while investigating child sexual abuse videos and photos on a file-sharing network.

The detective traced an IP address to a computer in Robledo’s Jacksonville apartment. Two FBI agents knocked on his door on April 18, 2017, questioned him and took his desktop computer.

According to the FBI, Robledo admitted to using file-sharing programs to “track down child sexual abuse material” and “locking that material in a secure program to prevent detection.”

On Robledo’s computer, investigators found 655 photos and two videos of child sexual abuse that had been downloaded between Feb. 19, 2016, and April 16, 2017, and stored in folders and subfolders, records show.

During the investigation, Robledo fled to Argentina, where FBI agents believe he remained for over six years. On April 26, 2017, a complaint was filed and a federal judge issued a warrant for his arrest in Jacksonville.

Robledo has been in federal custody since his arrest at the Miami-Dade County airport on July 2. According to records, the warrant was executed on July 5, the indictment was filed on July 19, 2023, and he pleaded guilty on March 6, 2024.

On Thursday, the U.S. Attorney’s Office announced that Chief U.S. District Judge Timothy J. Corrigan sentenced Robledo to eight years and four months in a federal prison and ordered him to serve 20 years’ probation as a registered sex offender.

Assistant U.S. Attorney D. Rodney Brown was in charge of the case. The Jacksonville Beach Police Department and U.S. Customs and Border Protection assisted FBI agents in Jacksonville and Miami during the investigation.