Connecticut Teacher Sentenced To Prison For Trading Child Porn While Posing As Teenager

A former teacher from Hartford, Connecticut, was sentenced to 70 months in prison for trading more than 100 images of child pornography while posing as a teenager on the messaging app Kik.

Dylan Koerner, 29, a former music teacher at Hartford elementary school had pleaded guilty in September to soliciting, receiving and distributing child pornography, according to a news release from the U.S. Attorney’s office.

Koerner posed as a teenage boy on the messenger app and convinced girls as young as 12 years to send nude pictures. He then traded those images with other Kik users for more child porn images, the news release said.

During a search of his property in October 2019, detectives confiscated his cell phone, laptop and external hard drive containing child pornography images and videos. The investigators discovered 121 photos and nine videos depicting child porn.

There were also numerous photos and videos depicting child erotica, local news outlet Hartford Courant reported.

The New Britain resident had posed as a teenage boy on social media platforms between July 2019 and October 2019, and duped the young girls while being employed as a teacher for elementary, middle and high school students, prosecutors told the court.

He earned his teaching certification in 2018 and worked as a substitute teacher at several schools in Connecticut, the U.S. Attorney's Office mentioned in the news release.

Koerner is now released on $100,000 bond and is ordered to report in prison on May 4. In addition to the 70 months sentencing, he is also sentenced to serve three years of supervised release.

The investigation was led by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s Homeland Security as part of the Department of Justice’s Project Safe Childhood Initiative.

The distribution of child pornography is considered a more serious crime than possession of child porn. Under U.S. Federal law, distribution of child pornography include any act permitting another person to physically copy child pornography images or videos. It also includes selling or giving away such images or videos.

The federal law allows the offenders to be punished with sentencing up to 30 years in prison and fine. These offenders when convicted often need to be registered as sex offenders.