Alden Man Arrested, Charged With Possession And Receipt Of Child Pornography

BUFFALO, N.Y.--U.S. Attorney James P. Kennedy, Jr. announced today that Brandon Kidder, 35, of Alden, NY, was arrested and charged by complaint with possession and receipt of child pornography. The charges carry a mandatory minimum penalty of five years in prison, and a maximum of 20 years.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Caitlin M. Higgins, who is handling the case, stated that according to the complaint, in August 2019, the FBI received information that a local IP address was accessing Tor, a computer network available to Internet users designed specifically to facilitate anonymous communication over the Internet to access child pornography. The IP address was subsequently traced to the defendant.

On January 28, 2020, the FBI executed a search warrant at Kidder’s Sandridge Road Apartment in Alden. Investigators seized two Samsung smartphones, a Thermaltake desktop computer, a Dell laptop computer, and two thumb drives. The two computers were submitted to the Western New York Regional Computer Forensics Laboratory (RCFL) for a full forensic exam. An initial search of the Samsung phones and thumb drives recovered videos and images of child pornography, some including infants and depictions of violence.

The defendant made an initial appearance before U.S. Magistrate Judge Jeremiah J. McCarthy and is being held pending a detention hearing on March 10, 2020.

The complaint is the result of an investigation by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, under the direction of Special Agent-in-Charge Gary Loeffert.

The fact that a defendant has been charged with a crime is merely an accusation and the defendant is presumed innocent until and unless proven guilty.