FRANKLIN COUNTY — Police have charged a 28-year-old Chambersburg man with 20 felony counts of child pornography and one count of illegal use of a communication facility after he allegedly uploaded a video to Skype that contained suspected child pornography.
Benny Seal II, of Limestone Drive, was taken into custody Tuesday, according to publicopiniononline.
Police began investigating him after receiving a tip from the National Center for Missing and Exploited Chidren.
The original file came from Microsoft, dating the upload to Feb. 5. The nine minute, 30 second video allegedly depicts a boy being sexually assaulted by a man, police say.
Seal was identified through CenturyLink, which shared his IP address in response to a subpoena from police.
Investigators with the Pennsylvania Attorney General’s Office, Homeland Security Investigations, and State Police obtained a search warrant for Seal’s home on Monday and searched his property Tuesday at 6 a.m.
Seal spoke with investigators in the bedroom of his home. He claimed his house hasn’t had internet since the start of the summer. He admitted to having a phone and a broken laptop, according to investigators.
Investigators say Seal admitted he received and sent child pornography using Skype under multiple usernames. He began viewing illicit material years ago, he allegedly admitted to police. He preferred to search for images of boys around the age of 13, as well as anime or other cartoon child pornography, using various websites, apps, and search engines, along with the anonymous web browser Tor, Seals told police.
Seal told investigators he never touched a child, but admitted he did babysit young boys in the neighborhood frequently, police say.
Investigators found at least 20 images of suspected child pornography saved on Seals’ laptop, but that was just a small sampling of suspected child pornography on the device.
Seals’ phone and laptop were seized and transported to the Computer Forensics Unit for further analysis, investigators say.
Seals is currently in Franklin County Prison on $75,000 bail, according to publicopiniononline.
