Md. man pleads guilty to child porn and secretly taping 84 kids using his home bathroom

On November 14, Jonathan Mark Oldale, 55, of Chevy Chase, Maryland, pleaded guilty to federal charges of production and possession of child pornography, arising from Oldale secretly filming children using hidden cameras in the bathrooms of his home.

According to Oldale’s plea agreement, on May 5, 2017, the Montgomery County Police Department received a complaint from an employee at a children’s gymnastics facility that Oldale had placed a backpack containing a camera disguised to look like an automobile key fob in a bathroom at the facility.  The employee also told officers about a prior incident in which Oldale had left a backpack in the same bathroom.  A search of Oldale’s residence on May 9, 2017, recovered electronic media, including three laptop computers.

A forensic review of the confiscated computers revealed that two of the computers had installations of browsers used to access the “dark web;” and some of the files accessed had titles consistent with child pornography.

The dark web is the part of the World Wide Web that requires specific software, configurations or authorization to access, allowing users and website operators to remain anonymous.  One of the laptops had previously connected to a dark web site used to exchange child pornography.

The third computer contained image and video files of children with exposed genitalia, including in public bathrooms.

On July 5, 2017, Montgomery County Police officers executed a second search warrant at Oldale’s residence and seized a cell phone, three “spy cameras,” six MicroSD cards (small memory cards used in cameras and phones to store information), and six USB drives.  All of the removable media, except one MicroSD card, contained videos created using surreptitious “spy” camera that had been placed by Oldale in bathrooms in his residence.

Videos recorded in the bathrooms show that the cameras were placed at waist height or lower, for example under the sink and in a basket in the shower, and that multiple cameras were placed in a bathroom.  The videos show that Oldale would enter the bathroom to adjust the cameras just before children entered the bathrooms and just after the children left.  Between May and July 2017, Oldale recorded more than 1,000 videos using the hidden cameras in his bathrooms.  The videos depict minor children changing into and out of bathing suits, taking showers, and using the toilet.

Children were invited to “splash parties” at Oldale’s residence in June and July 2017, including by e-mailed invitations sent to their parents.  Children would become covered with grass while playing on an inflatable structure in the back yard.  Oldale encouraged the children to change clothes or take showers before they went home.  Of the approximately 84 children who appear in the videos taken in the bathroom, approximately 60 are depicted nude at some point in the videos.

Forensic analysis of the USB drives revealed that Oldale stored videos in a nested file folder structure.  Subfolders were named for the month and within those folders were additional subfolders with event names, like party or camp.  On two of the USB drives there were subfolders that included lists of children’s names followed by a description of the swimsuit worn by the child.

In all, there were nine subfolders with names indicative of events and containing videos of children in the bathrooms at Oldale’s residence.

As part of his plea agreement, Oldale must register as a sex offender in the place where he resides, where he is an employee, and where he is a student, under the Sex Offender Registration and Notification Act (SORNA).  In addition, Oldale has agreed to the entry of a $400,000 money judgment in lieu of forfeiture of Oldale’s interest in his residence, which Oldale used to facilitate his crimes.

If the Court accepts the plea agreement, Oldale will be sentenced to between 15 and 25 years in prison.  U.S. District Judge Paula Xinis has scheduled sentencing for April 1, 2019.

This case was brought as part of Project Safe Childhood, a nationwide initiative launched in May 2006 by the Department of Justice to combat the growing epidemic of child sexual exploitation and abuse.

(Source: Department of Justice, U.S. Attorney’s Office, District of Maryland)

Also see:

• Search for kidnapped North Carolina teen enters day 7, reward increases to $20,000
• Police nationwide warn against sharing child porn video now going viral on Facebook
• Mom charged with taping sex abuse of her 2 young children, selling videos, posting them on Snapchat

 

~ Written by: Richard Webster, Ace News Today   /   Connect with Richard on Facebook and Twitter