A West Tisbury resident was arrested at his home on Skiff Avenue by State Police last month for possessing child pornography and is now out with conditions after posting a $25,000 bail, according to court records.
According to a police report submitted to the Edgartown District Court by State Trooper Ian Andrade, who’s part of the state department’s cyber crime unit, Andrew Carroll, 30, from West Tisbury, was arrested on Sept. 16 after police were approved for a search warrant at his residence.
The investigation started after Andrade was forwarded a CyberTipline report (CTR) by Snapchat on June 8 that included two separate files sent to Carroll’s Snapchat account, according to his report. The files included what Andrade’s report described as “lewd and lascivious content” that violated Massachusetts law on dissemination of child pornography.
Platforms like Snapchat are required by federal law to report suspected child sexual abuse content to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC). The content is logged as a CTR then forwarded to law enforcement.
One image is described in the report as “a nude prepubescent girl, approximately 7-10 years old,” exposed in a “graphic and lascivious manner.”
After State Police investigators subpoenaed Carroll’s phone and IP address records and state troopers conducted physical surveillance of Carroll’s residence, Clerk Magistrate Robert Manning approved a search warrant of Carroll’s residence on Sept. 16. Later that same day, the State Police Cyber Crime Unit, Crime Scene Services Section, STOP team, and the West Tisbury Police Department executed the warrant.
According to the police report, officers conducted a “post-Miranda” interview with Carroll in the basement of his home. Carroll cooperated with police, turning over his electronic devices, and taking ownership of the Snapchat account suspected to have the illegal content.
Carroll told police at the time that he was communicating with someone on Snapchat he believed to be 20 years old, who sent him the photos. Carroll said he recognized the material as child sexual assault material (CSAM) and blocked the individual on Snapchat. Officers found that Carroll had saved all of the files to his phone in a hidden folder. According to the report, Carroll stated to police he was not sexually attracted to minors.
“It should be noted that Andrew became emotional during the interview and stated he has been dealing with mental health issues as of late,” Andrade said in the report.
Before Carroll was taken into police custody, officers searched his iPhone on scene and discovered that within the hidden folder, there was also a video of a prepubescent female being raped by an adult male.
Carroll pleaded not guilty at the Edgartown Courthouse on Sept. 17 to the felony charge of possessing child pornography. Judge Benjamin C. Barnes set bail at $250,000 surety or $25,000 cash.
Carroll posted his $25,000 bail on Sept. 17, according to court records. His conditions include no unsupervised contact with anyone under 17 and a stay away from the location of the arrest.
A pretrial hearing is scheduled for 9:30 am on Nov. 12.
