Forest Hills Lawyer Charged with Possessing, Promoting Child Porn

By Forum Staff

Queens District Attorney Melinda Katz announced on Friday that attorney and former FBI agent John Magri was arraigned on charges of promoting a sexual performance by a child for allegedly sending child sexual abuse materials from a computer in his Forest Hills home.

Magri, 57, of Dartmouth Street, in Forest Hills, was arraigned Thursday night on an 18-count complaint charging him with six counts of promoting a sexual performance by a child as a sexually motivated felony; six counts of possessing a sexual performance by a child; and six counts of obscenity in the third degree.

According to the charges:

Magri’s activities were discovered during an investigation into the sharing of child sexual abuse materials online. The investigation turned up more than 700 files from an IP address tied to Magri. The files included videos with children approximately six years old and younger. One showed an infant.

The NYPD secured a search warrant for Magri’s residence. The warrant was executed Wednesday by the NYPD and Magri was arrested.

Two laptops – including one under Magri’s bed – a hard drive and a cell phone were recovered from the primary bedroom. Investigators also recovered a desktop computer, modem and five flash drives from a home office, a desktop computer from a living room and a laptop from under a bed in a secondary bedroom.

A forensic review of the laptop found un- der Magri’s bed revealed numerous videos and images depicting child sexual abuse materials, including several involving infants.

“The horrific allegations against the defendant are all the more disturbing given that he was someone who had sworn to uphold the law. The exploitation of children simply will not be tolerated,” Katz said. “Thank you to our law enforcement partners for their work on this investigation.”

If convicted, Magri could be sentenced to up to seven years in prison.