A father upset by the alleged theft of his son's iPod by the boy's assistant principal, led him to set up a fake profile for the AP on a porn site, causing the AP to loose out on a job, and then after being arrested by police and claiming his son did it, has been convicted of two felonies, as reported by AZ Central.
R.D.E. Jr., 34, opened a false profile for Gateway Pointe Elementary School's then-Assistant Principal F.H. last year.
According to Detective D.O., from the Maricopa County Sheriff's Office Computer Crimes Unit, F.H. denied R.D.E. Jr.'s allegations of the iPod theft and the item has never been located.
F.H. is now the interim principal in the Higley Unified School District with plans to continue for the 2012-2013 school year.
Detective D.O. said that the fake porn profile was created under F.H.'s name in May of 2011 and had pulled photographs directly from the school website – and some of those photographs included F.H.'s wife.
There were over 20 pornographic videos attached to the fake profile, as well as vulgar
photographs of body parts that were attributed to D.H.
D.O. said that R.D.E. Jr. didn't stop with photos and videos, he chatted on the site and created an email address, all under D.H.'s name. When someone would search D.H.'s name online the porn site would pop up.
D.O. said, "I'm sure this guy (R.D.E. Jr.) felt that it was funny, thought it was a joke. He definitely could have damaged this guy's (D.H.'s) reputation and his job prospects."
Superintendent D.B. commented, "I think the police did a good job at their investigation…This is unusual, inappropriate and sad that this happened."
In June of 2011, when D.H. was seeking employment in another Arizona school district, a parent had found his name on the site – just after he was offered a job as a principal. Then, according to D.B., the district told D.H. that they were withdrawing their offer.
D.B. added, "To our benefit, we were looking for a principal internally and (eventually) promoted him as principal…" and, the porn site was "very cooperative" in removing the profile.
R.D.E. Jr. was located by police through his IP address that linked to his work laptop. A search warrant of his home produced further evidence on his home laptop.
At first R.D.E. Jr. claimed that it was his son, now 14, who set D.H. up on the porn site. However, during a two-hour recorded interview with police, R.D.E. Jr. admitted that he was guilty party.
D.O. said, "At 13, it didn't seem possible for the son to be writing the things that were written on there. (R.D.E. Jr.) then admitted he had done it all and said he was doing it just to slander him (D.H.)"
R.D.E. Jr. will be sentenced for the two felonies, taking the identity of another and computer fraud, on June 5.
Criminal charges, no matter how weak or strong, require that you contact a criminal defense attorney for help. Don't delay, get to work with an attorney on your case right away!
