A former Alexandria public schools teacher has admitted that he possessed thousands of child pornography images and created explicit videos of young children.
Justin Coleman, 35, pleaded guilty in federal court in Alexandria on Wednesday to two counts of producing child pornography.
When Coleman was arrested in April, he was a fourth-grade dual-language teacher at John Adams Elementary School. A grand jury indicted him on June 16, and he was terminated from Alexandria schools on June 22, according to the school district.
Coleman produced child pornography by recording “his sexually explicit conduct with two different prepubescent children,” according to documents filed with Coleman’s guilty plea.
When authorities examined his computers and hard drives, they found more than 2,500 child pornography images that Coleman had altered, court documents say. Prosecutors said Coleman altered existing child pornography so it appeared that his former female students were engaging in sexually explicit acts.
“Identifying adults who abuse positions of trust to engage in this sexually explicit conduct is our highest priority,” Neil MacBride, the U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia, said.
Investigators found a total of more than 75,000 child pornography and erotic images and about 1,000 videos in Coleman’s possession.
His attorney didn’t respond to a request for comment.
Court records say Italian law enforcement authorities found 900 people in the United States who had accessed a child pornography website in one of their investigations, and U.S. officials identified one of those users as Coleman.
When federal agents first searched his Falls Church home in April, Coleman initially denied having accessed child pornography sites, court documents say. He later told authorities that he viewed pornography two or three times a week and preferred to see images of girls ages 5 to 12.
Coleman told the agents that there was a “Justin at home and a Justin at work” and he was afraid “they will mesh together,” according to court documents.
Coleman is scheduled to be sentenced on Oct. 28. He faces a mandatory minimum sentence of 15 years in prison for each count, according to his plea agreement. In total, he could receive up to 60 years in prison.
Coleman had taught in Alexandria since 2005.
