Hamilton Man, 18, Arrested for Online Child Exploitation

MERCER COUNTY, NJ - A Hamilton Township man has been arrested and charged following an investigation into online child exploitation, Acting Mercer County Prosecutor Theresa L. Hilton announced on Friday.

According to a statement, Gerald Keener, 18, an employee with the Hamilton Township YMCA, is charged with one count of second-degree distribution of child sexual abuse material (CSAM), one count of second-degree possession with the intent to distribute CSAM and one count of third-degree possession of CSAM.

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The prosecutor’s office has requested that Keener be held pending trial.

An investigation was launched, Hilton said, after detectives with the prosecutor’s Internet Crimes Against Children (ICAC) Unit received information from the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children that an individual in Mercer County was distributing items that portrayed the sexual exploitation or abuse of a child.

Through that investigation Keener was identified as a subject.

Members of the prosecutor’s ICAC Unit, with assistance from the Hamilton Police SWAT Team, executed a search warrant at Keener’s Hamilton residence on August 28 with detectives seizing multiple items of “evidentiary value.”

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Keener was taken into custody without incident.

The investigation is ongoing. Anyone with information is asked to contact the prosecutor’s Special Victims Unit at (609) 989-6568 or mcposvu@mercercounty.org.

Hilton further urged anyone with information about suspected improper contact by unknown persons communicating with children via the internet or possible exploitation or sexual abuse of children to contact his Internet Crimes Against Children (ICAC) Unit at (609) 989-6568 or the New Jersey Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force tip line at (888) 648-6007.

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