iStock
Jan. 28, 2022 By Christian Murray
The police busted an Astoria man yesterday for allegedly possessing child porn.
Eric Levi, an attorney who resides on 45th Street, was nabbed by police after an online investigation linked his IP address to 50 files containing naked photos of children performing sex acts.
He was arraigned Thursday night and charged with 514 counts of promoting a sexual performance by a child and other child porn crimes, according to authorities.
“As alleged, the defendant downloaded and viewed numerous images of nude prepubescent children engaged in sexual acts with adult males on his computer in his home,” said Queens District Attorney Melinda Katz in a statement. “These images of youngsters aren’t just pictures, but crime scene photos of children being abused.”
According to the charges, police traced computer files that contained pornographic images of children to an IP address. The IP address was linked to Levi’s home address and apartment number in Astoria.
A court-authorized search warrant was executed Thursday morning at Levi’s residence and police recovered an Apple computer, a USB storage unit and an iPhone.
A detective conducted a forensic search of Levi’s computer and found more than 10 images of children between the ages of 6 and 8 naked revealing their genitals. Levi allegedly admitted to pleasuring himself to the images and blamed COVID-19, saying that he was lonely during the pandemic.
Levi faces up to seven years in prison if convicted. He has been ordered to return to court on March 25.
