Trenton, NJ — Child predator police officers are an unfortunate and all too common reality in the land of the free. On a near daily basis, cops across the country are busted for horrifying acts against children.
Highlighting the severe nature of this problem is the fact that two cops in a single department were recently arrested for possession and sharing child porn.
On Tuesday, New Jersey State Trooper Andrea V. Knox of Mount Holly was arrested and charged with official misconduct and possession of child pornography, according to the state Attorney General’s Office.
Knox is accused of receiving the child porn from trooper Jeffrey Reitz of Williamstown. Reitz was indicted in December on two counts of possession of child pornography. Those charges were related to a separate exchange of texts with a different woman, the statement said.
“During those exchanges, the woman proposed that Reitz sexually assault a young girl and sent him a sexually explicit photo of the girl,” the Attorney General’s Office said.
Horrifyingly enough is the fact that the text had described the girl as the woman’s own 5-year-old daughter.
A criminal complaint in that case alleges Reitz responded to the child’s photo by texting “NICE!” and making a reference to sexual arousal.
Knox made similar exchanges with Reitz. As of now, she has been charged for failing to report Reitz when he sent her the images. But more charges could follow.
“Knox failed to report that Reitz shared items of child pornography with her, despite her duty as a police officer to enforce and uphold the laws of the State of New Jersey,” the attorney general’s office said in a statement on Tuesday.
The initial images were discovered on Reitz’ iCloud account and further investigation into that account revealed the exchange with Knox.
As the Courier Post reports:
Additional images of alleged child pornography were found in an iCloud account that belonged to Reitz, the statement said.
It said further investigation of the iCloud account revealed alleged text exchanges between the troopers that allegedly included sexually explicit conversations about an underage girl.
According to the statement, Knox asked Reitz for details about sex acts he’d like to perform on the child during a text exchange on Aug. 27, 2018.
“The following day, the pair had another sexually explicit text exchange, during which Reitz sent Knox photos of people at a nudist location” the statement said.
The images included photos of two girls “with their genitals visible” it said.
“Knox failed to report that Reitz shared items of child pornography with her,” the statement said.
Neither of the officers have been fired and remain suspended without pay after their arrests.
Earlier this month, TFTP reported on another state trooper arrested for child porn. In 2018, Louisiana State Police Trooper of 18 years, Jason Boyet received one of the department’s highest honors — Trooper of the Year. Fast forward two years, and this hero cop is sitting in a jail cell after being arrested on charges of production and distribution of child pornography.
Also earlier this month, another former cop was arrested in connection with a child sex ring. As TFTP reported late last year, a high level Livingston Parish Sheriff’s Office deputy — who commanded the SWAT team — and his wife were indicted on more than 150 felonies for unspeakable crimes against children and animals.
Dennis Perkins, 44, and and his wife Cynthia Perkins, 34, are accused of multiple counts of child rape and the production of child pornography, among other disturbing charges. Then, at the beginning of the month, another former cop, Melanie Barnett Curtin, 41, of Denham Springs, was arrested Saturday, Feb. 1 as she returned from a cruise in New Orleans.
Adding to the disturbing nature of this case is the fact that Curtin worked for the Livingston Parish Sheriff’s Office starting in 2011 — the same department as Perkins. Her ex-husband is also a former LPSO deputy.
Curtin was arrested on two charges: first degree rape and video voyeurism in connection to crimes committed with the Perkins. She was booked into the Livingston Parish Detention Center Feb. 1. Judge Jeff Johnson set a bond of $250,000 for Curtin’s first degree rape charge and $100,000 for the video voyeurism charge on Feb. 3, according to WAFB.
It is a sad day when police officers — the ones who claim to protect us — are caught preying on society’s most vulnerable. However, there are a lot of sad days as this situation plays out like a broken record, over and over again.
Reference: Thefreethoughtproject.com
