Westchester County District Attorney Miriam E. Rocah announced today that a Yonkers resident was sentenced to a term of three to six years in state prison for sharing child pornography on social media. The defendant was on probation for a prior sex offense conviction at the time of his arrest.
DA Rocah said: “Addressing the growing dangers online is critical and it’s why we enhanced our Cyber Crimes Bureau in 2022 to focus on criminal investigations involving threats to minors on the internet, social media and gaming platforms. Let this sentence serve as a reminder that my Office will relentlessly investigate and prosecute sex offenders, especially those who exploit and threaten our children.”
On two occasions between March 2021 and April 2022, Demetrious Kotopoulos, 41, uploaded a digital file of a nude child engaged in sexual conduct to Discord, a social media messaging platform, and was in possession of a video of an approximately 10-year-old child engaged in a sexual act. Further, between August 2018 and April 2022, the defendant failed to disclose the creation of a new email address to the New York State Division of Criminal Justice Services, a mandatory requirement of all registered sex offenders. An investigation determined the email address was used to access Discord.
The Cyber Crimes Bureau and High Technology Crimes Squad of the Westchester County District Attorney’s Office conducted the investigation after receiving a referral from the Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force Program (ICAC), a national cybercrimes prevention organization. The District Attorney’s Office arrested the defendant on April 21, 2022, with assistance from the Westchester County Department of Probation.
On September 20, 2022, the defendant pleaded guilty to Promoting an Obscene Sexual Performance by a Child, Possessing an Obscene Sexual Performance by a Child, and Failure to Register and to Verify, all felonies, and also admitted to violating conditions of his probation. The defendant will be required to re-register as a sex offender upon completing his prison sentence.
The defendant was previously sentenced on April 10, 2018, to 10 years of probation, which carried sex offender conditions, after pleading guilty in May 2017 to Promoting an Obscene Sexual Performance by a Child and Possessing an Obscene Sexual Performance by a Child. The defendant was certified as a Level 2 Sex Offender by the Court in June 2018.
The District Attorney’s Office thanks the Westchester County Department of Probation for their collaboration on this case. The case was before Judge Susan Cacace in Westchester County Court, and was prosecuted by Cyber Crimes Deputy Bureau Chief Laura Forbes of the Trials and Investigations Division.
