A Connecticut teacher took hundreds of inappropriate photographs inside a high school — including upskirt shots of an unsuspecting student in class, police said.
Christian Stevenson, a former social studies teacher and varsity golf coach at Rockville High School in Vernon, was arrested Monday on child pornography and voyeurism charges, the Hartford Courant reported.
Arrest warrant affidavits show cops were tipped off by state police that the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children had info about images of suspected child porn being uploaded through Yahoo email accounts, WFSB reported.
Investigators later linked the images of 48 young girls either nude, partially nude or performing a sex act to the 52-year-old Stevenson. They originated in Moldova in Eastern Europe and date back to 2011, Vernon police said.
But cops also found more recent images on Stevenson’s iPhone during the execution of a search warrant at his home in September, including hundreds that appeared to be taken inside Rockville High School. He resigned last month after school district officials were notified of the child porn probe.
Cops recognized two students, ages 15 and 17, in the photos, which focused on young female students’ backsides, breasts or genitals. One image showed an upskirt shot of a teen student in his social studies class, cops said in one warrant.
Police interviewed the 15-year-old girl, who said she was “extremely distraught” by the revelation because she had respected Stevenson so much, the Hartford Courant reported.
The 17-year-old student whose backside appeared in one of the photos told cops she still owned the shorts she was wearing at the time and “now felt the need to burn them,” police wrote in a warrant.
“Some of the photographs/recordings appeared to have been taken while Stevenson was sitting at a desk, others while behind students in a hallway,” cops said, WFSB reported. “I observed images of students at school sporting events that appeared to have been taken covertly.”
Vernon Public Schools put Stevenson on administrative leave on Sept. 15 when cops notified district officials that he was being investigated. He resigned the same day, the station reported.
Stevenson, who taught at the school for 22 years, has been charged with importing child pornography, eight counts of voyeurism, nine counts of disorderly conduct and related counts.
The Vernon man was in custody Monday on $300,000 bond, the Hartford Courant reported.
An investigation is ongoing, police said.