UPDATE: Sears To Remain In Custody, Orders Of Protection To Be Requested For Children

UPDATE: Monday, January 28, 4 p.m.

U.S. District Magistrate Judge Gary Brown ordered that Mr. Sears remain in custody during a hearing on Monday afternoon after his defense attorney, Mr. Barker, failed to provide the court with a bail package—which would include an official request for bail and an accounting of Mr. Sears’s finances.

During the hearing on Monday, Assistant U.S. Attorney Allen Bode, who is prosecuting the case, told the court that, so far, all images found in Mr. Sears’s apartment were morphed images and it was not believed he has any pictures of him actually performing inappropriate acts on children or other inappropriate photos of children. However, Mr. Bode said the investigation was continuing.

Mr. Bode, who spoke for approximately two minutes during the five-minute hearing, also said that investigators have had success in identifying many of the children represented in the pornographic images, and he will soon be seeking orders of protection for the children, whose families will be notified soon.

An order of detention, which was originally issued on Friday when U.S. District Magistrate Arlene R. Lindsay described Mr. Sears as a flight risk and a risk to the community, will remain in place under Judge Brown’s order, until another bail hearing can be scheduled at the request of Mr. Barker, or until trial. Federal prosecutors have asked that Mr. Sears remain in custody in a federal jail in Nassau County, without the possibility of bail.

The bail package, in which the defense would ask that Mr. Sears be released on a certain amount of bail—was to outline to the court what Mr. Sears could afford to pay, and what the defense thought would be a reasonable amount. It is unclear why Mr. Sears’s attorney did not present the bail request.

On Monday morning, Mr. Nardoza confirmed that the prosecution now has 30 days to bring Mr. Sears before a grand jury for possible indictment. Currently, he is being held for possession of child pornography, but an indictment might include additional charges. Mr. Nardoza also said that Mr. Sears could possibly face separate charges for each child found in the hundreds of images seized. It is unclear at this time how many counts of possession of child pornography Mr. Sears could face.

Mr. Sears, dressed in an orange jumpsuit, did not address the court at the hearing on Monday. Afterwards, a friend of Mr. Sears, David Glover of Yaphank—the only person in attendance in support of Mr. Sears—said that he was shocked about the charges leveled against his friend. Mr. Glover, who has known Mr. Sears for 25 years, declined to speak specifically about the charges, but said that he cannot believe that Mr. Sears would hurt anyone.

“I have never known him to hurt anyone,” Mr. Glover told reporters. “I think he needs support—Jay has helped many people in the community so I felt compelled to be here for him.”

UPDATE: 3:30 p.m.

Jay Sears was arraigned at 3 p.m. Friday in federal court in Central Islip on one count of possession of child pornography. He did not enter a plea.

U.S. District Magistrate Arlene R. Lindsay declined to set bail, stating that Mr. Sears is a “danger to the community and young children.” She added that she believes Mr. Sears to be a flight risk.

Mr. Sears, who was wearing beige slacks, a blue sweater, a tan jacket and a green scarf and carrying his cane, did not speak during his arraignment. He will return to the same court at 2 p.m. on Monday, January 28, to revisit the bail issue.

His attorney, Daniel Barker of Riverhead, declined to speak with reporters after the arraignment.

ORIGINAL STORY

East End architect Jay Lockett Sears, founder of the Mission of Kindness organization in Quogue that benefits troubled families, was arrested Friday morning at his home on charges related to possession of child pornography, representatives from the Federal Bureau of Investigation have confirmed.

Mr. Sears, 73, was arrested at his East Moriches apartment by investigators with both the FBI and the Suffolk County Police Department’s Computer Crimes Squad for allegedly having in his possession images of identifiable minors superimposed on the bodies of adults and performing sexual acts, according to a copy of the complaint.

The complaint states that on or about January 11, 2013, a man whose identity was withheld by investigators contacted the Suffolk County Police Department after discovering the pornographic materials while emptying a Dumpster at the Brookhaven Town dump transfer station in Brookhaven. An experienced child pornography investigator, identified in the complaint as Detective Rory Forrestal, examined the materials “and immediately recognized them to be similar to materials from a prior SCPD investigation of the defendant JAY LOCKETT SEARS in approximately 2007.”

The materials, the complaint states, “appear to be photographs depicting adult bodies engaged in sexually explicit activities with the heads of identifiable minor children cut out and pasted onto the pornographic materials. In addition, there were a number of photographs containing the head of the defendant SEARS cut out and pasted onto male bodies, posing with the identifiable children.”

The complaint, which is signed by FBI special agent Danielle Messineo, states that she believes that Mr. Sears used photographs of children taken at public events, including local beach and yacht club parties and society events. The document also states that Mr. Sears participated in the practice for at least several years and used a photo processing facility in Westhampton Beach—it was not identified by name in the complaint—to develop the photographs.

Child pornography is defined as, among other things, when a “visual depiction has been created, adapted, or modified to appear that an identifiable minor is engaged in sexually explicit conduct.” The complaint filed by Ms. Messineo states that, based on this definition, “images are illegal child pornography where the head of an identifiable minor is cut and pasted onto an image to appear as if the minor is engaged in sexually explicit conduct.”

She also states that recent court decisions have confirmed that the modification of such images—a process known as “morphing”—qualifies as child pornography.

In the case United States v. Hotaling, the defendant, John C. Hotaling, was charged with possession of child pornography after authorities said he combined pictures of six female minors with pornographic images of adults to make it appear that the minors were engaging in sexually explicit conduct. On February 28, 2011, the U.S. District Court of Appeals, Second Circuit, ruled that “the district court was correct in holding that child pornography created by digitally altering sexually explicit photographs of adults to display the face of a child is not protected expressive speech under the First Amendment.”

In that case, Mr. Hotaling was charged with one count of possession of child pornography after he admitted to creating and possessing sexually explicit images of six females that had been digitally altered through the “morphing” process. He had challenged his indictment, arguing that the statue that applied was unconstitutionally vague and overbroad, according to court documents. Mr. Hotaling, who ultimately pled guilty and was sentenced to 78 months in prison, had argued that no children were harmed or exploited by him, and that the photographs existed solely to “record his mental fantasies” and, as a result, were protected free speech.

If found guilty, Mr. Sears faces up to 10 years in prison.

Mr. Sears, who sold his home in Quogue Village in 2008, was a principal in the architectural firm Sears & Sears, also based in Quogue. He has been renting the apartment in East Moriches since 2006, according to the complaint.

The document states that Det. Forrestal interviewed a second unidentified person, a contractor, who indicated that the materials in question came from Mr. Sears’ second-floor townhouse-style apartment in East Moriches, which he was moving out of on Monday, January 28. The contractor, the complaint notes, turned over four additional black plastic garbage bags containing several hundred images of child pornographic materials depicting identifiable children and Mr. Sears.

Also on January 11, a Suffolk County Police Department officer recovered a box containing similar types of materials at a waste transfer station in Yaphank. Those images also featured children and Mr. Sears.

The complaint goes on to state that on or about January 15, Det. Forrestal interviewed the maintenance manager of the apartment complex, which was not identified, who stated that Mr. Sears was known “to be a hoarder” and that he was in the process of cleaning out his apartment prior to moving out at the end of the month. The manager, who was not identified, told police that he had observed what appeared to be a toy gun inside Mr. Sears’ apartment. Det. Forrestal, in her report, states that toy guns are depicted in many of the photographic materials that were recovered.

One of the altered photographs recovered by detectives is that of a nude female body in a sexually suggestive position with a nude male body, according to the complaint. The woman’s head had been replaced by that of a blond girl between the ages of 12 and 14, while the man’s body featured the head of Mr. Sears. Detectives also recovered what they believe to be the original photograph featuring the girl in the altered photo, and that it depicts three girls and appears to have been taken at the Quogue Beach Club. Authorities have not yet identified the three girls, though they said that they are clearly identifiable.

Another image shows a nude female body from behind featuring the head of another minor pasted onto the woman’s body. The image depicts a female child celebrity, according to the complaint, that is known by authorities. Other recovered images suggest that Mr. Sears created this image using a photograph of the child taken in 2011, when she was approximately 11 years old.

Mr. Sears is scheduled to be arraigned on Friday afternoon before U.S. District Magistrate Arlene R. Lindsay at the federal court in Central Islip, according to Robert Nardoza, a public information officer with the U.S District Attorney’s office, which is handling the case.

Mr. Nardoza is asking that parents who believe that their children may have been the victims to call the Suffolk County Computer Crimes Squad at 631-852-6279 or the Federal Bureau of Investigation at 631-501-8600.