Federal prosecutors have indicted a former school staffer from Petersburg, a community of 3,000 in Southeast Alaska's panhandle, for possessing and distributing child pornography. Tye Leif Petersen, 46, could spend the rest of his life in jail if convicted.
A federal grand jury in Juneau handed down a three-count indictment against Petersen. The charges stem from distributing, receiving and possessing child pornography. Police originally charged Petersen the day before Halloween, and he was jailed pending trial.
Petersen has worked as maintenance director of the Petersburg School District since 2002. He resigned from the position Oct. 29 and headed for Alaska's capital city, where he was arrested and appeared in U.S. District Court. He did not enter a plea.
Charges say that in late July, an FBI agent got a search warrant for a Yahoo email account. A review of the email account's correspondence showed "prolific" trading of child porn between it and 50 other addresses. Fifty-eight of those trades were sent between the Yahoo account and Petersen.
Most of the emails contained images or videos of "very young children" being sexually abused, the charges say.
Three months after the digital search, federal agents and local police searched Petersen's home. They found ten CDs loaded with child porn. Authorities interviewed the former maintenance director later that day, and he allegedly said he'd received the illegal materials on various email accounts. He then gave up the user name and passwords of three accounts.
A federal investigator found email exchanges including child porn images in the accounts, the charges say.
According to Assistant U.S. Attorney Jack Schmidt, the lone federal prosecutor in Juneau, Petersen faces five to 20 years in prison for receiving and distributing child porn. The possession of child porn charge carries a maximum sentence of 20 years; the images depict children younger than 12.
Following Petersen's arrest, Petersburg City School District Superintendent Robert Thomason said he sent out letters to the parents of students in the district rather than hold a large assembly or visit individual classrooms.
"It's a sensitive issue, and we thought it was more appropriate for the parents to deal with it how they saw fit," Thomason said. That approach was overwhelmingly supported, he said.
The district also bought a radio spot to inform the community of Petersen's arrest and the charges against him. When the superintendent last spoke with the federal law enforcement officials, he was told none of the images depict local children. Petersen will continue to investigate whether Petersburg kids were abused.
Petersen had limited contact with the children, Thomason said. He worked out of his office unless something needed fixing, Thomason said.
Contact Jerzy Shedlock at jerzy(at)alaskadispatch.com. Follow him on Twitter @jerzyms.