A Jamaica man who coached and participated in basketball workouts with teenage boys is serving a jail sentence for producing child pornography, prosecutors announced on Friday.
Robert Walker, 43, of 164th Street was ordered to serve between 1 1/2 and 4 1/2 years behind bars after pleading guilty last month to first-degree disseminating indecent material to minors.
According to Queens District Attorney Richard A. Brown, Walker allegedly engaged in a video chat with a 15-year-old boy on April 22, 2014, and instructed him to strip and pose naked. He then told the youth to send him nude pictures of himself.
Based on an investigation, police arrested Walker in November 2014 and recovered from his home electronic devices that were found to contain the video and 27 additional images of children – some as young as 8 – engaging in sexual acts with men.
Brown said that Walker later admitted to detectives that he held workouts with teenage boys, then later asked them to strip so he could take pictures and videos of them.
Prosecutors said he also manipulated some of the boys into engaging in explicit acts through online video chats.
“The defendant took advantage of his trusted position as a basketball coach and violated the teen boys he instructed in a disgusting manner to satisfy his own sexual needs,” Brown said in a statement. “The victims will undoubtedly be scarred for the rest of their lives as a result of this man’s manipulative actions.”
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