Prison For Registered Sex Offender Who Shared Child Pornography Online

YONKERS, NY — A Yonkers resident has been sentenced to three to six years in state prison for sharing child pornography on social media.

Demetrious Kotopoulos was on probation for a prior sex offense conviction at the time of his arrest.

"Addressing the growing dangers online is critical and it’s why we enhanced our Cyber Crimes Bureau in 2022 to focus on criminal investigations involving threats to minors on the internet, social media and gaming platforms," Rocah said. "Let this sentence serve as a reminder that my Office will relentlessly investigate and prosecute sex offenders, especially those who exploit and threaten our children."

On two occasions between March 2021 and April 2022, 41-year-old Kotopoulos uploaded a digital file of a nude child engaged in sexual conduct to Discord, a social media messaging platform, and was in possession of a video of an approximately 10-year-old child engaged in a sexual act. In addition, between August 2018 and April 2022, he failed to disclose the creation of a new email address to the NYS Division of Criminal Justice Services, a mandatory requirement of all registered sex offenders. An investigation determined the email address was used to access Discord.

The Cyber Crimes Bureau and High Technology Crimes Squad of the Westchester County District Attorney’s Office conducted the investigation after receiving a referral from the Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force Program (ICAC), a national cybercrimes prevention organization. The District Attorney’s Office arrested Kotopoulos on April 21, 2022, with assistance from the Westchester County Department of Probation.

On September 20, 2022, Kotopoulos pleaded guilty to promoting an obscene sexual performance by a child, possessing an obscene sexual performance by a child, and failure to register and to verify, all felonies, and also admitted to violating conditions of his probation. He will be required to re-register as a sex offender upon completing his prison sentence.

Kotopoulos was previously sentenced on April 10, 2018, to 10 years of probation, which carried sex offender conditions, after pleading guilty in May 2017 to promoting an obscene sexual performance by a child and possessing an obscene sexual performance by a child. He was certified as a Level 2 Sex Offender by the Court in June 2018.

The District Attorney’s Office thanked the Westchester County Department of Probation for their collaboration on this case. The case was prosecuted by Cyber Crimes Deputy Bureau Chief Laura Forbes of the Trials and Investigations Division.