Teacher Faces 16 Counts Of Child Porn Possession

BROWNSBURG, Ind. -- A Pike High School teacher faces 16 counts of possession of child pornography after a computer shop technician discovered the files on the teacher's computer, police said.

Jason Krockenberger, 35, was arrested Thursday at his home in the 10000 block of East County Road 450 North.

Krockenberger had taken a desktop computer to the Computer Shop Inc. for repair and a technician at that business found videos and images that depict child pornography on the computer, said Brownsburg police Capt. Jeff Gray.

"Most people, when they go to hide child porn or ... anything like that, they typically ... will put it in a hidden folder," said computer technician Joey Trudeau. "His was more or less right there."

Trudeau said he called Krockenberger to tell him what he found on the computer and said the teacher pleaded with him to erase the porn, but Trudeau called police.

The Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force was called in to examine files on the computer and a laptop and found numerous videos and images of child pornography, Gray said.

Police said Krockenberger, who has been at Pike as an earth science teacher for five years, admitted that he had child porn on his desktop and laptop computers and told them that he took his laptop to his classroom to view the images and videos there.

"He did elaborate on that and explained that this would be more of an an after hours activity," said Brownsburg police Detective Jennifer Pyatt.

Police said they are currently pursuing two additional child pornography cases in Brownsburg, but they don't think they are connected to Krockenberger.

6News was unsuccessful in attempts to reach Krockenberger and Pike High School officials for comment. No children have come forward in Krockenberger's case.

Nicole Smith, who owns the computer shop, said she's proud of her technician for doing the right thing.

"I want that creep off the streets. Whatever we can do in the community to help not have this happen again to someone else -- I hope that justice serves him well," Smith said.