WESTFIELD – A city man was arraigned on child pornography charges after a detective from Arizona contacted the Massachusetts State Police.
A Det. Randal Snyder from the Pinal County Sheriff’s Office in Florence, Arizona, contacted the MSP Detective Unit on April 5 regarding an ongoing investigation into the distribution of child pornography.
MSP Trooper Matthew Simpson of the Division of Investigative Services — Hampden State Police Detective Unit outlined the details of the case in a nine-page memo, which describes what led to the charges against Brian A. Calhoun of 12 Fremont Street.
Calhoun, 34, was released on $10,000 personal surety after being arraigned in Westfield District Court Thursday on charges of distributing material of a child in a sexual act and possessing child pornography, according to court records.
According to Arizona Detective Snyder, the case involves “sexual exploitation of a minor” involving the Kik texting app, Simpson wrote.
“Kik is a trendy, cross-platform smartphone application” used for instant messaging friends individually or in groups, according to webtrends.about.com.
In October, “while conducting proactive investigations into the trade of child sexual exploitation images on Kik messenger,” Snyder found a subject, identified by a user name (which later turned out to be Calhoun), posting an image and five videos depicting “sexual exploitation and abuse of young children, likely under the age of 15,” according to Simpson’s memo.
Calhoun was identified after Snyder issued subpoenas to Kik, who provided a confirmed email address, as well as to Comcast and Sprint, who identified Calhoun’s phone model and IP address. It took nearly two months for Arizona detectives to gather this information from the subpoenas, according to Simpson.
MSP began its own investigation, and on April 14, conducted surveillance outside of Calhoun’s Fremont Street home in Westfield.
On April 20, six MSP troopers, one Westfield police officer and two WPD detectives executed a search warrant at 12 Fremont Street, which included interviewing Calhoun and his wife.
Information obtained through the interviews and items found in the home during the search, confirmed Snyder’s allegations, including the type of phone Calhoun owned/used, his Internet service provider, Calhoun’s usernames on various accounts including Kik and two phones that contained child pornography, according to Simpson.
The images included pictures of females, ranging in age from 6 to 14-years-old engaging in sex acts with each other or with adult males and images of young females posing in a “lascivious manner,” Simpson wrote.
Calhoun allegedly admitted to having possessed child pornography and to having sent child pornography–images allegedly retrieved from Tumblr and others he got through Kik, Simpson wrote.
Calhoun denied having ever produced child pornography and denied having ever touched a child in a sexual manner, according to Simpson.
Allegedly Calhoun told Simpson during the April 20 interview that his father and his brother are both convicted sex offenders and “he knew where this could lead so he stopped before it went too far,” Simpson wrote.
Westfield District Judge Philip A. Contant released Calhoun with 25 “additional conditions of pretrial release,” including not having any unsupervised contact in any way with a child age 17 or under nor is Calhoun to reside in the same dwelling with any child age 17 or under, including his own children.
Calhoun is due back in Westfield District Court on July 12 for a pretrial conference.
Staff Writer Christine Charnosky can be reached at [email protected]
Follow her on Twitter @charnoskyWNG
