Fairfax County Police Watch: Ex-Mansfield cop arrested in child porn case

Ex-Mansfield cop arrested in child porn case

Man charged after federal probe of website

Kaitlin Durbin

News Journal

MANSFIELD — A former Mansfield police officer is among more than two dozen people arrested by federal agencies in a national child pornography case.

Robert Anderson of Lucas was arrested Feb. 7 on allegations he knowingly received and distributed child pornography, according to a complaint filed in the Northern District United States District Court.

Anderson, 69, was a patrol officer for the department for 25 years, retiring in September of 2000, according to city finance records.

“What he did in his retirement years is not a reflection of the men and women that work at the Mansfield Police Department,” Police Chief Ken Coontz commented. “It’s a disgraceful act no matter who gets charged with it.”

A hearing has not yet been scheduled, but if Anderson is convicted of the charge, he could get 10 years or more in prison. His court-appointed attorneys, Charles Fleming and Edward Bryan, could not be reached for comment.

“The weight of the evidence against the defendant is substantial, including images seized under a search warrant and a confession,” Anderson’s detention order said. “There is evidence that the defendant unsuccessfully attempted to hide additional storage devices containing illicit images of minors after his arrest.

“Although the defendant has no prior criminal history and long-established ties to the community, these are insufficient to overcome the statutory presumption in the light of the foregoing.”

The arrest was the result of an investigation that spanned three years and involved the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Homeland Security Investigations, Cyber Crimes Center, Child Exploitation Investigations Unit, Victim Identification Program, as well as various international law enforcement agencies, the complaint said.

Through the investigation, at least 24 people were identified as possible users of a website, identified only as “Website A.” Authorities said the site allows people to post, distribute and trade sexually explicit images of children. In many cases, according to the report, users also exchanged emails for the purpose of distributing more images.

The website is hosted outside of the United States.

“Often evidence from the images, and comments posted about the album (either by other individuals or the member who created the album), indicates that the particular poster or person who created the album has a sexual interest in children,” the complaint said, “and that these individuals’ interest in Website A lies in the ability to meet other individuals for the private trading of child pornography.”

In June 2012, Homeland Security Investigations obtained data from the website — including usernames, album names, passwords, comments and associated email addresses and IP logs — that helped lead to Anderson’s arrest.

A “Website A” member account authorities believe to be run by Anderson, titled “bob1431b,” reportedly contained six albums with at least 44 photos of young girls’ underwear and prepubescent teens in the nude, the complaint stated.

One of the albums, entitled “preview,” was found to contain 38 images, most or all including a pubescent teenager suspected to be from north central Ohio, the complaint said.

Attached to one of the photos was a comment from “bob1431b” saying, “email me for trades, I have many hot vids and pics, some homemade and hidden cam,” according to the complaint.

The investigation notes that user “bob1431b” last modified his albums in October 2012, but when authorities accessed “Website A” on Jan. 15, 2014, it was determined that the user “continued to remain active and to maintain a profile and the same or similar albums on the website,” the complaint said.

A gmail account also linked to the website’s username and traced back to Anderson revealed another 25 images and four videos containing child pornography, the complaint said.

The evidence indicated Anderson had traded child pornography with at least two other Internet users between Sept. 18 and Nov. 18, 2013. In one of the exchanges, Anderson sent nine image attachments, three of which constituted child pornography, the report said.

When Homeland Security Investigations agents raided Anderson’s home Feb. 6 and conducted an on-site preview of a thumb drive computer media device, they reported finding several other images of suspected child pornography.

Anderson admitted, according to the complaint, that he registered the email address and was the sole user of the computers in the home.

He also agreed to an interview with FBI Agent Lance Fragomeli, in which he “admitted to receiving and sending files containing child pornography. Anderson also admitted that he had saved some of these images and had created a collection which he had hidden away,” the complaint said.

Morrogh finds cop he doesn’t love. In other news, hell freezes.

Probe of fatal police shooting goes to federal authorities

By Justin Jouvenal/Post

The Fairfax County prosecutor has turned over the investigation of a fatal police shooting of an unarmed Springfield man to federal authorities, citing complications with the five-month-old case.

Commonwealth’s Attorney Ray Morrogh said the U.S. attorney’s office for the Eastern District of Virginia has agreed to continue the probe into the death of 46-year-old John Geer, who was shot during a standoff with Fairfax County police in August. No one has been charged in the incident.

“There is a conflict of interest that has arisen in the case,” Morrogh said Thursday. “And there is a second potential conflict of interest that has arisen out of my office. . . . This is the prudent thing to do.”

Morrogh declined to describe the nature of the conflicts because the investigation is ongoing. The U.S. attorney’s office said Thursday that it could not confirm or deny any investigation or comment on pending investigations.

Police went to Geer’s Pebble Brook Court home on Aug. 29 because of a report of a domestic disturbance. Geer’s father, Don Geer, said his son was upset because his girlfriend, the mother of his two children, had decided to leave him.

John Geer had thrown his girlfriend’s belongings in the front yard. She called police and told them that Geer had a firearm. Police said they tried for about 50 minutes to persuade Geer to leave the home, but he refused.

Don Geer said he watched the climax of the encounter. He said that he could not hear what officers were saying to his son but that he saw him standing with empty hands resting on top of a screen door at the home’s entrance.

At some point, John Geer began to slowly lower his hands and an officer opened fire, hitting Geer in the chest, his father said. Geer retreated inside and closed the door. A SWAT team eventually entered the home and found Geer dead.

Don Geer said detectives later told him that his son did not have a gun on him at the time of the shooting but that there was a holstered handgun a couple of steps from the front door.

Don Geer said it appeared to him that the shooting was unjustified, but he was unsure what to make of the probe being turned over to federal authorities.

“I don’t know whether that’s good or bad — if I had a better idea of why they are doing it, I could form an opinion,” he said.

Geer and friends of his son have been critical of how long the investigation has taken, but Morrogh said police and prosecutors were working to explore all the evidence. He did not think federal prosecutors would have to start from scratch.

“No one wants these things to linger on,” Morrogh said.

Our ink will outlast his career

Our ink will outlast his career

Under the reign of former Chief of Police Rhorer the Fairfax County Police arrested a man for not wearing clothes in his house while he made coffee, set up an eye doctor on a gambling charge and then used the SWAT team to kill him. An investigation into the charge that the Doctor’s primary clients were cops has never been investigated. The police gunned down an emotionally unstable man because cop who shot him wrongly assumed the man was trying to escape. He wasn’t. The cops also shot dead four other citizens under highly questionable circumstances. The department under Rhorer was sued multiple times by citizens. So did they fire Rhorer? Naw they promoted him. According to news reports Rhorer draws a salary of $191,168 per year as Deputy Fairfax County Executive as well as a concurrent pension from the Fairfax County police of $173000 per year.

Occupation by force

According to the most recent U.S. Census figures, nearly one in five Fairfax residents (17.5 percent) is of Asian descent while Hispanics make up nearly 16 percent of Fairfax’s overall population. Those numbers drop considerably when applied to the Fairfax County Police Department, where only 4.3 percent of officers are Asian and 4.1 percent Hispanic. White officers make up 84 percent of Fairfax County’s 1,360-member police department, significantly higher than the county’s general population (54 percent white). Almost 90% of the force lives outside the county.

The law is a gun, which if it misses a pigeon always kills a crow; if it does not strike the guilty, it hits some one else. As every crime creates a law, so in turn every law creates a crime. Edward George Earle Lytton Bulwer-Lytton, 1st Baron Lytton

Our government is the potent, the omnipresent teacher. For good or for ill, it teaches the whole people by its example. Crime is contagious. If the government becomes a law-breaker, it breeds contempt for law; it invites every man to become a law unto himself; it invites anarchy. Louis D. Brandeis, part of his dissent in the case "Olmstead v. United States", 277 U.S. 438, 485 (1928)