Law&Crime Sidebar - 'Next Level Disturbing': Volunteer Santa Arrested on Child Porn Charges in Florida

Episode Date: July 19, 2023

A former fire chief who volunteers as a Florida town’s Santa was arrested on child porn charges on July 13. Sixty-two-year-old James Jude Silverstone stands accused of amassing an illicit collection of over 1,500 images of child pornography. Silverstone was also the former commissioner and fire chief in the Lauderdale-by-the-Sea community. The Law&Crime Network’s Jesse Weber breaks it down with renowned journalist and predator catcher Chris Hansen.LAW&CRIME SIDEBAR PRODUCTION:YouTube Management - Bobby SzokePodcasting - Sam GoldbergWriting & Video Editing - Michael DeiningerGuest Booking - Alyssa Fisher & Diane KayeSocial Media Management - Vanessa Bein & Kiera BronsonSUBSCRIBE TO OUR OTHER PODCASTS:Court JunkieThey Walk Among AmericaDevil In The DormThe Disturbing TruthSpeaking FreelyLAW&CRIME NETWORK SOCIAL MEDIA:Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lawandcrime/Twitter: https://twitter.com/LawCrimeNetworkFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/lawandcrimeTwitch: https://www.twitch.tv/lawandcrimenetworkTikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@lawandcrimeSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

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keep you on the edge of your seat. Don't let your fears take hold of you as you dive into this addictive series. Love thrillers with a paranormal twist? The entire Oracle trilogy is available on Audible. Listen now on Audible. A volunteer Santa in Florida is arrested on child pornography charges. Renown reporter and predator catcher Chris Hansen comes on to discuss this wild new story. Welcome to Sidebar, presented by Long Crime. I'm Jesse Weber. Well, it appears that nothing is really sacred or innocent anymore, is it? Because listen to this development out of Broward County, Florida. 62-year-old James Jude Silverstone, who worked as the Lauderdale by the sea commissioner, a fire chief, and as a volunteer Santa, has been

arrested on child pornography charges. Think about that. It's pretty unbelievable, right? Well, according to the Broward County Sheriff's Office, detectives began investigating this computer user who was downloading child pornography more than 210 files, and these are things containing images and videos of child pornography. And they actually tracked that back to Silverstone. And when they conducted a search of his house, they found hundreds of additional photos and videos of child porn,

including children as young as infants engaged in sexual acts. I believe the number is over 1,500 images. Yeah. Well, he has been charged with 10 counts of transmission of child pornography by electronic device. And clearly, we want to talk about this. So I want to bring in a very special guest. Somebody who knows a thing or two about catching sexual predators. I'm joined by my good friend Chris Hansen, who is the host of Take Down with Chris Hansen, this new predator series on True Blue. This is the streaming crime network. And in fact, they have an upcoming news magazine called True Crime Nation. You can check it all out on watchtrueblood.com.

and that's blue b l u chris great to see you and i think this is our first time together on sidebar it's great to see you yeah jesse thanks for hand me i appreciate it what an awful disturbing story i was going to say it was shocking to me is it shocking to you or is this just par for the course the nature of the material jesse is truly shocking and it's it's a prime example of why the penalties are so severe for the possession and distribution of child pornography, because as you know, every time an image like this is viewed, it's the re-victimization of a child, whether that child is in New York or overseas or in Asia. It doesn't matter. And so you have a case here where, and we see this in our predator investigations, the culprit, the alleged culprit, is otherwise seen as a fine,

up standing man in society. He's the Santa Claus for the local village. He's the fire commissioner. He's on the county commission. He's living this straight life. And all the while, according to the affidavits and the crime documents that you and I have looked at, he has been downloading and potentially distributing multiple, multiple images of child porn here. We're not talking about one or two or something that could have been a mistake. They stepped into his IP address and found some 93,000 images of which they viewed 1,500 and found them to constitute child pornography, violent victimizations of children. It's hard to imagine, and I was thinking of the best way to summarize this.

There was a detective who wrote up the probable cause affidavit, and I just want to quote him here because this is the real concern other than the fact of anybody obtaining and using these materials. This was Silverstone's access to children. They said, quote, as he is entrusted by parents who bring their children to sit with and or on top of Santa Claus during the holiday season, that's where this really becomes next level disturbing. Well, and then you have to consider, Jesse, that every expert I know in this field, the guys and women who work for U.S. Marshals, the psychiatrists who go into the prisons and interviews, sex effects. almost universally, they will tell you that actually offending, sexually assaulting a child

comes after viewing child pornography. There is a definite link, it is undeniable, it is verifiable. So then you have to ask your question, how long would it have been until a guy who's got children sitting on his lap posing a Santa Claus actually offends and assaults a child? It's a legitimate question and one that is extraordinarily worrisome when posed to a person in a position of public trust. That's a really good point. As of right now, I know this investigation is still ongoing into him to see what exactly he was up to. But, I mean, he hasn't been accused of actually physically abusing any children. But you make a great point that it seems like it could have been a natural extension if, in fact, he is guilty of these crimes.

I want to play you something. So this is a local 10 reporter from Florida confronting Silverstone outside of. of court. Let's take a listen to this and we'll talk about it on the other side. The people that look up to you, you were Santa Claus. I mean, what do you want to tell those former constituents of yours? Again, I'm like, I'm like in the comments, so I don't waste your time. Well, I just want to make sure I give you the opportunity to at least, even if it's not related, you tell you your former constituents. I still, I can't really say anything. There are neighbors that look up to you that told us they're completely in shock. Should they be in

Chuck? Were you aware there was an investigation underway? I really can't say anything. Sorry. I'm not surprised by that. Legally speaking, as an attorney, I would advise him not to say anything to the media. I will tell you, the minute I saw that, I thought to myself, what would Chris Hansen say to this guy? So if you had him, if you had a position where you had him one-on-one, you were talking to him, maybe it was a sting operation, what would you have said to him? What kind of information would you have tried to get? I would have tried to get him off balance a little bit and ask a question that would provoke a different response besides no comment. And sometimes that works and sometimes it doesn't. But if you, in my experience, having interviewed, you know, hundreds and hundreds of these guys, I would ask something like, what do you say to your wife over this?

There are 1,500 images of pre-bubescent children being forced into sex, violent graphic sex acts. How do you square that with your position as the talent? Santa Claus, a position of leadership in the local fire department, in local government. How do you justify that? Is there any defense whatsoever? I mean, again, as you said, Jesse, everybody's innocent until proven guilty. I suppose there's a chance that somehow these just migrated to his computer electronic devices, but it doesn't seem likely. It seems like the authorities in this case got tipped to this. Some wire was tripped indicating that he was accessing this known source of very disturbing illegal child pornography

and that they traced it right back to his IP. They then executed a search warrant. And, you know, you looked at the affidavit just like I did 1,500 images so far. Yeah. I mean, that should be a sentence if somebody's found guilty of that. Yeah, it's hard to say that was an accident. It's also equally horrifying that someone created this content.

You know, it's not like him abusing these kids and he's watching it over. somebody else was doing this you mentioned the defense by the you're exactly right that's the so there's a market for it that's the part that is just equally disgusting you know and we've seen this uh with people in the public trust you know and the more recent to take down predator investigations we've done for true blue we've had a 61 year old doctor who came to our sting house to have sex of the teenage girl after chatting with her an entire day sending her a picture of his penis, all the while seeing 18 patients in his family practice, right?

So here's a doctor who's seeing all his patients, and in the course of that, is texting with a teenage girl, having a highly inappropriate sexualized conversation, sending a picture of his private parts, and then coming over to visit with Oreo cookies because he had a fantasy about seeing the Oreo cookies in her braces. And so we see these people in very professional positions. We've seen police officers, vice presidents of corporations, religious leaders, and no demographic category is immune to this. And these people develop these obsessions and compulsions and addictions, often starting with child porn and or, you know, inappropriately age pornography. And then they have to fulfill this fantasy by trying to meet a child.

And it's like, Jesse, I'd liken it to a heroin addiction. You know, when somebody's hooked and they know they can get heroin, but they know that there's a 20% chance that fentanyl is in it, or there's a 20% chance that it's a Chris Hanson sting or a sheriff department sting. They're so obsessed with this that they do it anyway. They throw caution to the wind, and it continues to be a huge problem. And the number of platforms upon which adults can approach children and can access child pornography is stunning and continues to. to grow on the internet. Yeah, and the fact that people, it comes out of nowhere. Like you said, no group is immune and people are shocked by this.

I read this from an unidentified neighbor of Silverstone who said, I can't believe this has happened. This is absolutely not correct. I've known his character for 30 years. He's an outstanding individual, one of the finest humans I've ever. He saved lives. I mean, he volunteers to do everything for everybody. I've also been with him when he's been a volunteer, Santa.

I mean, he's just a consummate good, good doer. And then she goes on to say, well, this neighbor goes on. to say somebody's out to get him this is not right i'm furious and anybody else who knows him would be too i'm shaking i'm so upset there is that idea of now again he is innocent until proven guilty but there is that level of denial that either people have they can't accept or just comes out of left field that the person you last at least expect would be doing this right and and it is shocking and it is hard to believe that somebody who is trusted by an entire community on three different levels. This guy had three different positions. And God, is nothing sacred? This guy

is the Santa Claus with children on his lap. Are we now to have to worry about every time we take children and grandchildren to the mall to sit on Santa's lap? I mean, maybe, you know, I have a decidedly, you know, dark view of the world sometimes based upon all the reporting I've done. But still, you don't want to believe it's come to that, but you do have to be vigilant. And I understand the neighbor and the neighbor's experiences with this fellow being all positive and all good and you don't want to believe it and especially when we enter into this age of conspiratorial thinking and people getting their news from you know not the best of sources you can see where people start to think that way but look law enforcement doesn't go into these cases lightly and there is

very definitely a trail and an electronic fingerprint linking him to this and it's all laid out in the affidavit as you saw and as I read. So while everybody is innocent until proven guilty, it does not look great for this Santa Claus in this case. While the evidence like you said is very strong, there's always two sides, his attorney came out, said, quote, you know, one thing is to charge somebody with a crime. Another thing is to prove it. So there are a number of different issues and different avenues we're going to pursue my perspective. That is the, that is the response of an attorney who just was handed the case and wants to see where it's going to go. Because it's tough. These cases can be very straightforward, very easy to prove, especially of that electronic footprint.

Chris Hansen, thank you so much. It was great seeing you. Let everybody know where they can find you and see more of your content. So our new streaming crime network is True Blue, T-R-U-B-L-U, watch TrueBlue.com for details upon that. We have our new Predator Takedown series. We have 30-40 new episodes up as we speak. We've got about a dozen documentaries in the works, all compelling crime stories. And True Blue is becoming the place for this sort of true crime, compelling, investigative reporting and documentaries. And I want people to check it out. Podcasts, predators I've caught with Chris Hansen,

available on all platforms and virtually every other social media platform. We're TikTokers now even. So we promote all our content there as well. Chris is a phenomenal dancer. People don't realize this is TikTok dances. Next level in case you didn't know. Chris, great to see it. No, I do.

I do want to see that. Chris, it was great to see you. Thanks so much for coming out to Zibir. For having me. I appreciate it. All right, everybody, that's all we have for you here on Sidebar. Thank you so much for joining us. Please subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, wherever you get your podcasts.

I'm Jesse Weber. I'll speak to you next time. Apple Podcasts or Spotify.