ALLEGHENY COUNTY, Pa. — An employee of Keystone Oaks School District is facing felony child pornography charges.
Investigators determined that 32-year-old Thomas Duxbury, who is a music and orchestra teacher, was the person responsible for uploading the child pornography.
According to a release from Allegheny County police, the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children received a cyber tip regarding multiple videos of suspected child pornography being uploaded from a specific user in July 2021.
The cyber tip was forwarded to the FBI’s Child Exploitation and Human Trafficking Task Force, which is made up of federal and local law enforcement.
Allegheny County detectives initiated an investigation.
“You worry he’s in possession of that, what else could he have done?” said Angi Dudas, a Keystone Oaks parent.
RELATED: Allegheny County investigators dealing with backlog in child porn tips
Keystone Oaks parent Angi Dudas was sick to her stomach as she read the criminal complaint against Duxbury - her 14-year-old daughter’s chorus teacher.
“It’s bad … It’s so bad. I’m not going to read it because I already have nightmares.”
Allegheny County police filed five felony child porn-related charges against the Keystone Oaks music teacher.
As the news broke—Channel 11 went directly to Duxbury’s home for answers.
He stood there with nothing to say to our camera.
A woman came up from behind him, telling us to go away, and slammed the door.
“It’s pretty upsetting because all these kids trusted this guy,” said Dudas.
Police say the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children got a cyber tip last July that a person identified only by a username was sending videos of an underage girl performing sex acts.
County police say they started on the case in March of 2022 when they got the tip to their database.
It took until April 22 to identify Duxbury as the suspect because they had to trace IP addresses, email accounts, and user names on social media.
Investigators eventually searched his home where they found 18 videos and 80 images of child porn on his phone.
Duxbury worked with students in both Keystone Oaks middle and high schools up until April 22 when the district says County police told them about the investigation and he was placed on leave.
Dudas said she had previously met Duxbury and said her daughter told her she thought he was a nice teacher.
She says she is now questioning everything.
“How do you process this? Somebody you trusted with your kids is now probably going to end up in federal prison.”
Duxbury is free on a non-monetary bond.
A Keystone Oaks School District spokesperson Spokesperson said in a statement “We understand that this news is very troubling and will have an impact on our students, families, and employees. Counseling support will be made available to students; any student who needs assistance should reach out to their school counselor or building principal. Employees who need assistance can reach out to the district’s Director of Human Resources, the Director of Pupil Services, or their building principal.
The safety of our students is our top priority. We do not take this situation lightly and we will continue to work with the Allegheny County Police Department throughout the course of their investigation. At this time, we are unable to share any additional information.”
TRENDING NOW:
©2022 Cox Media Group
/cloudfront-us-east-1.images.arcpublishing.com/cmg/XCUXZC2XYZHCRGNNGKFEX6U3LQ.png)
