A 54-year-old former Long Island high school coach and administrator has admitted to downloading child pornography videos off the Internet onto a computer at his Patchogue home.
At Central Islip federal court on Wednesday,Kevin Barry O’Connell pleaded guilty to receiving child pornography.
“Charged by [his] profession with caring for children, the defendant instead acted to foster their victimization by receiving numerous images of the abuse of children,” said Kelly Currie, acting U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of New York.
Prosecutors said O’Connell downloaded video files of the rape and abuse of children as young as 8 years old, which he kept on thumb drives that investigators found hidden in a jacket pocket while executing a search warrant of his home in 2012.
Upon his arrest, O’Connell was suspended from his employment as an assistant superintendent for secondary education in the Roosevelt Union Free School District. He had previously served as the principal of Bellport Senior High School, assistant principal at Walter G. O’Connell Copiague and was varsity baseball coach at William Floyd High School from 1990 to 2001.
He faces up to 20 years in prison and a $250,000 fine when he is sentenced.
