Minneapolis elementary school teacher charged with possessing child sexual abuse material
A Minneapolis elementary school teacher is facing 14 felony charges after police found a phone in his possession with at least nine images containing child sexual abuse material, according to a criminal complaint.
The 35-year-old man was charged in Hennepin County court on Friday.
Charges say Minneapolis Park Police were called to Brackett Field Park on the 2700 block of 39th Avenue South Wednesday afternoon for a report that the man was there to give a "substantial quantity of child sexual abuse materials to another individual."
Responding officers spoke to several people who work for a group aimed at uncovering online activity that involves soliciting minors for sexual acts and distributing child sexual abuse material.
The group told police the man was talking online with a 17-year-old member, who told the man in their conversations that they were a 13-year-old boy, charges say. Their conversations started in March, were "overtly sexual in nature" and involved the distribution of sexual images of adults and children.
According to charges, the man told the 17-year-old posing as the boy his "dream is to marry a younger pedo" and that he had 87 gigabytes of child sexual abuse materials with more than 1,000 videos on what he called his "pedophone."
The group told police another member, posing as the boy's father, also spoke with the man online. During this conversation, the man agreed to meet up with the hypothetical father and boy at the Minneapolis park, court documents say. In a phone call before the meeting, the man offered to share child sexual abuse materials.
Charges say the group called law enforcement when the man arrived at the park.
Officers found a flash drive and a phone on the man when they arrested him, according to court documents. The phone contained 18,466 files.
"A preliminary review of 40 random files were found to contain images of juveniles performing sexual acts," the criminal complaint said.
Court records show the man is charged with one count of distributing material relating or describing sexual conduct to a child through electronic communication, one count of engaging in electronic communication relating or describing sexual conduct with a child, one count of soliciting someone believed to be a child to engage in sexual conduct through electronic communication, two counts of disseminating pornographic work and nine counts of possessing pornographic work of a minor under 14.
The Minneapolis Park and Recreation Board says the man was employed as a teacher at Sullivan STEAM School at the time of his arrest.
WCCO reached out to Minneapolis Public Schools for comment, but unfortunately due to data privacy laws, they are unable to share information at this time. However, a spokesperson from the district said, "the safety of our students is our top priority."
Officials are asking anyone with information in connection with this investigation to call the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension predatory crimes tipline at 651-793-2465.
If you know of a child who may have been a victim of exploitation, call the National Center for Missing or Exploited Children at 1-800-843-5678 or visit the .
