A Waipahu man was ordered held without bail Thursday after he allegedly collected and distributed child pornography, according to federal court records.
James Moreno was arrested and charged by criminal complaint Feb. 2 with one count of possession of child pornography and one count of distribution.
He consented to detention, and U.S. Magistrate Judge Kenneth J. Mansfield granted a motion by the U.S. Department of Justice to hold Moreno without bail.
A preliminary hearing is scheduled for 10:30 a.m. Feb. 20 in Mansfield’s court.
Moreno’s attorney, Assistant Federal Public Defender Maximillian J. Mizono, did not reply to a Star-Advertiser request for comment. Assistant U.S. Attorney Darren W.K. Ching is prosecuting the case.
On Dec. 1, law enforcement got a tip that an IP
address associated with Moreno’s Leowahine Street apartment was “being used for the distribution of child pornographic material,” according to federal court
records.
From Dec. 8-16, law enforcement using the BitTorrent network downloaded the images allegedly distributed by Moreno’s Waipahu IP address.
The criminal complaint notes four files downloaded by federal agents, ranging from 49 seconds to a little more than a minute, depicting girls younger than 12 and younger than 10 having sex with adult men.
On Feb. 2, FBI special agents in Honolulu working with the Hawaii Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force executed a search warrant at Moreno’s apartment.
The task force is part of a cooperative nationwide network “dedicated to protecting children in the online environment” with the help of the U.S. Department of Justice’s Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency
Prevention.
Moreno allegedly told agents after waving his Miranda rights that he used BitTorrent to download child pornography since
at least 2020.
Moreno allegedly admitted to downloading and storing child pornography on “multiple devices in the apartment” and “watched child pornography for sexual gratification.” Moreno
estimated he had thousands of videos stored on devices in the apartment he shared with his brothers.
“Moreno stated that no one else in the house knew how to work BitTorrent. Moreno told Agents he was smart with computers and his brothers were not. Moreno lived in the same room with his brothers but did not discuss his interest in child pornography with them,” read the Feb. 2 complaint and affidavit by an FBI agent. “Additionally, Moreno stated he did not share his devices with anyone.”
Agents also found child pornography files on his Samsung Galaxy mobile phone, including a five-
minute-long film. Moreno
allegedly admitted to agents he would search for child pornography using the terms “pthc,” which stands for preteen hardcore, and “July jailbait.”
“These are common terms known among Law
Enforcement used by individuals involved in the
distribution of child pornography,” read the
affidavit.
When asked about his
access to children, Moreno allegedly told agents he “watches his 10-year-old nephew several days a week.”
“Their normal routine
was to go to the park in
the afternoons and Moreno would play outside with his nephew and the other neighborhood children,” read the complaint.
Federal agents “observed a video on Moreno’s phone of children on the playground.”
Moreno allegedly told agents he was expecting law enforcement to “come to his residence at some point because of the volume of child pornography he had downloaded.”
