NEWPORT – A 36-year-old Newport man has been arrested on 20 charges of encouraging child sex abuse after a 10-month investigation into the downloading of child pornography from the internet.
Kurtis Fegulia is being held in the Lincoln County jail on bail of $500,000 and scheduled for a probable cause hearing Thursday, May 29 in Lincoln County circuit court.
In a probable cause affidavit, Newport police said they first received a tip last August from a federal task force that investigates internet crimes against children. Since then, detectives received 34 tips from the task force that led them to an internet account being used by Fegulia, the affidavit said.
Newport and Lincoln City police served a search warrant Tuesday on Fegulia’s home in the Harbor Village Trailer Park in Newport and arrested him there.
With the assistance of the Internet Crimes Against Children task force, Newport police allege that Fegulia downloaded or shared more than 11 hours of videos and more than 800 separate files depicting child sex abuse, including some in which the victims were under one year old.
Newport police said their investigation is still active and asked the public if they have information on the case to call Detective Darren Cicerone at 541-574-3348 or use the department’s tip line at 541-574-5455, or Text-a-Tip at 541-270-1856 or tipline@newportpolice.net.
