A Windham man is facing child pornography charges after police say he admitted to downloading thousands of images of young children.
Cote Noonan, 32, was arrested Friday and charged with one count each of possessing and distributing child pornography. This was after he allegedly told an undercover FBI agent “that he is attracted to babies and toddlers” and that when he was 12 he began abusing an infant regularly, according to an arrest warrant by FBI Special Agent Stephanie Rattigan.
Rattigan said Noonan confessed to downloading the images as police searched his house Friday, when he also admitted to taking pornographic images of an infant relative.
Noonan was taken into federal custody and appeared before U.S. Magistrate Karen Frink Wolf in Portland last Friday, according to federal records. He is scheduled to return to court this week, where Wolf will consider if he should remain in federal custody while awaiting trial.
His attorney, federal public defender David Beneman, said Tuesday that his office does not comment on pending cases.
Many of the images police found – on Noonan’s laptop, his cellphone and two hard drives – depicted children younger than 12 years old, according to the affidavit.
The FBI’s investigation started in October after Noonan began messaging an undercover FBI agent in an online forum known for exchanging child pornography.
Noonan, then known only by his username, “Femboy Cassidy,” sent the FBI employee three videos involving boys between 7 months and 7 years old.
The FBI employee was able to identify Noonan’s IP address on Dec. 8. Rattigan said she later learned that the same IP address was also the subject of three tips that the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children had received in April from the website Imgur, flagging his account for possessing, manufacturing and distributing apparent child pornography, according to the affidavit.
While police were searching Noonan’s home on Friday, Noonan, who was not yet under arrest, voluntarily told officers he had taken pornographic images of his infant relative and that he intended to distribute those, but never did, according to court documents.
“I repeatedly told him during the interview that he was not under arrest and he was free to leave at any time,” Rattigan said.
According to his LinkedIn profile, Noonan is a research scientist at Sappi in Westbrook, where he has worked since 2018. He graduated from the University of Maine in 2013. In a statement Wednesday afternoon, the company said Noonan “is no longer employed by Sappi.”
Noonan also used an email address for Maine state employees as his backup account, Rattigan wrote. A spokesperson for the Department of Administrative and Financial Services said Tuesday the state has no record of that address or Noonan as an employee. An email to that email address came back as undeliverable Tuesday afternoon.
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