BROWN COUNTY (WTAQ-WLUK) – A warning from police for all parents to monitor their kids’ internet activity.
It comes after a student in Brown County was charged with possessing child porn, which investigators say he accessed through the internet.
Internet crimes, including child pornography, are all too common for the Brown County Sheriff’s Office.
Lt. Jim Valley with the Brown County Sheriff’s Office spoke to WLUK.
“We investigate 100-150 cases a year”
One of those cases involves 17-year-old Brandon Zittlow.
Zittlow is facing 10 counts of possessing child pornography. He was in court Thursday.
Prosecutors say he viewed and shared child porn using the file-sharing service Dropbox, and the phone app, Kik.
Valley is familiar with both.
“Dropbox, we’ve seen before, we’ve done numerous cases before involving it, and also Kik. Kik is notorious, you can chat anonymously with other people, you can trade images.”
Valley recommends that parents keep an eye on their kids’ phone and internet activity.
“I don’t think every kid wants their parents to see what they’re doing and I understand that. However, I think in a lot of ways, the parents have the right because they know what the consequences are of getting into certain content” According to the criminal complaint, Zittlow stated that while he acknowledges and takes responsibility for his mistakes, he also stated he did not realize that viewing child pornography was illegal at the time, while he himself was a minor.
Valley said, “Anytime you have an image of someone under the age of 18 in an unclothed state, it’s illegal to possess, it doesn’t matter what age you are.”
And in Wisconsin, 17-year-olds are treated as adults in the court system.
Zittlow is out of jail after paying the $5,000 bond.
As part of the agreement, Zittlow cannot use any device that is able to access the internet.
