A Florida man has been charged in what the sheriff calls the “most disturbing thing I’ve ever seen.” The Brevard County Sheriff’s Office has arrested 35-year-old James Cohen of Melbourne for possessing Child Pornography.
Cohen was taken into custody after an arrest warrant was issued by Judge Ben Garagozlo, charging Cohen with ten counts of Possession of Material Depicting the Sexual Performance of a Child.
Cohen is in the Brevard County Jail Complex on a ‘No Bond’ status.
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The investigation began after the Sheriff’s Office received a Cybertip from the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children about a person uploading child sexual abuse material.
Information gathered from the Internet Service Provider, Spectrum, identified a residence in the city of Melbourne that was under the control of Cohen and his father.
“I’m going to tell you, I’m not happy with Spectrum or any of these other providers, as it took Spectrum from Jan 24 to May 15 to return the information to us. This put innocent lives of children at risk,” said Brevard County Sheriff Wayne Ivey.
An employment check revealed that Cohen was employed by Brevard Public Schools as an Instructional Assistant, currently assigned to Tropical Elementary in Merritt Island. It was further learned that Cohen had secondary employment at KinderCare, also located in Merritt Island.
Ivey said on Wednesday that Cohen had a clean record and no prior criminal history.
Agents prepared and served a search warrant at Cohen’s residence on Thursday, May 18, 2023, and at the same time, conducted an interview with Cohen at his place of employment.
Multiple electronic devices were seized from the residence during the search. Cohen admitted during his interview that the internet identifiers listed in the Cybertip were his and further admitted to viewing images described in the Cybertip; however, he said that he had deleted them.
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Upon being informed of the investigation, the Brevard County School Board immediately suspended Cohen, and KinderCare removed him from their facility.
A forensic examination of just one of the devices revealed that it contained 170 videos and 10 images of child sexual abuse material.
Multiple images depicted the sexual abuse of children and infants by adults, including penetration and bondage.
“Videos of babies being bound and bondage,” said Sheriff Wayne Ivey. “These are babies. These are freaking babies that this individual is getting off on watching. Innocent babies that this piece of garbage was enjoying watching.”
Ivey said the children in the videos are very young, with some appearing to be newborns.
Upon the discovery of this evidence, an arrest warrant for Cohen was obtained, and he was taken into custody without incident.
Currently, no evidence has been discovered that Cohen produced any images. However, additional forensic examinations are being conducted on all of his seized devices.
Anyone who may have information in reference to this investigation or the identity of any potential victims, is asked to please call Agent Aimee Slater of the Brevard County Sheriff’s Office, Criminal Investigative Services, at 321-633-8400.
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