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He was caught due to an undercover officer.
Ryan Decarolis, 27, of Fitchburg, pleaded guilty on Monday, Sept. 21, in U.S. District Court, to five counts of sexual exploitation of a minor, two counts of distribution of child pornography, and one count of possession of child pornography, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office, Massachusetts.
Decarolis was busted by an undercover officer, according to court documents. In 2019, law enforcement agents had taken over the social media account of an alleged child pornographer who, at that point, had already been charged with crimes against minors.
Decarolis unknowingly communicated with the undercover officer and in January 2019, Decarolis gave child pornography to the undercover agent. In April of that month, Decarolis provided the officer with access to his cloud-storage Dropbox account, which contained hundreds of images and videos of child pornography, the U.S. Attorney’s Office said. At least one of the videos was of Decarolis sexually assaulting a boy.
In August 2019, law enforcement agents searched Decarolis’s Fitchburg residence and seized the man’s tablet, which contained more child pornography videos.
They also found several other Dropbox accounts where Decarolis stored child pornography. In these accounts, law enforcement officials found videos Decarolis made of himself sexually assaulting boys, at least four of whom were under the age of 12, the U.S. Attorney’s Office said.
Decarolis is facing a lot of potential jail time. Sexual exploitation of a minor carries a mandatory minimum sentence of 15 years in prison and five years to the lifetime of supervised release as well as a fine up to $250,000. He is also facing jail time on the other charges.
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