What to Know
- A New York City teacher has been arrested for allegedly trading child porn videos on the dark web, the NYPD said
- Jonathan Schweitzer, 41, who teaches at Belmont Preparatory High School in the Bronx, was arrested early Wednesday morning, police said
- A spokesperson for the city's Department of Education said the department will "seek to fire him as soon as legally possible"
A New York City teacher has been arrested for allegedly trading child porn videos on the dark web, the NYPD said.
Jonathan Schweitzer, 41, was arrested early Wednesday morning, police said.
Schweitzer has taught at Belmont Preparatory High School in the Fordham section of the Bronx since 2008, a spokesperson for the city’s Department of Education said.
“These are incredibly disturbing and saddening allegations, and Mr. Schweitzer was immediately removed from the classroom away from students,” the spokesperson said in a statement. “We will remove him from payroll and seek to fire him as soon as legally possible.”
Prosecutors say Schweitzer shared around 10 pornographic videos on a peer-to-peer file sharing network between at least February and March of this year.
"The child pornography included depictions of prepubescent children engaged in sexual activity with other children or adults," the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of New York said.
Local
"Schweitzer works in a position of trust, responsible for teaching the young people of New York City for more than a decade. Yet, he is alleged to have shared and received child pornography in various dark-web chatrooms," Special Agent-in-Charge Angel Melendez said in a statement.
Law enforcement officers executing a search warrant Wednesday found several files with child pornography on his laptop, prosecutors said.
Schweitzer had no prior disciplinary history, the DOE spokesperson noted.
His attorney information wasn’t immediately available Wednesday.
