A Florida father who grew concerned about his son's posts about guns on Snapchat and Instagram, handed his son's two phones over to police which allowed investigators to find something much more disturbing, reports the Miami-Herald.
According to the report, the father of Sean Mesa, 18, linked his son's posts about guns to the shooting in Parkland, Florida, that claimed 17 lives, with the father fearing his son might have plans to shoot up his own school.
While police found photos of the teen with guns he's not supposed to have, they also found child pornography that led to the arrest of the high school student on Friday.
The report states that officials began looking into Mesa on Tuesday after the U.S. Homeland Security Investigations’ Violent Gang Task Force notified local law enforcement about the pictures discovered online after the Parkland shooting, with the arrest warrant stating Mesa was "recklessly displaying firearms and pointing them at the camera."
Miami-Dade Schools Detective John Messenger was sent to Dr. Michael Krop Senior High in Ives Estates on Tuesday to try to “engage in a friendly conversation to understand what Sean Mesa’s fascination with firearms was,” only to receive hostile answers from the teen who told the investigator, “he likes guns and it was his right to post on social media whatever he wished," the report states.
That meeting led to Mesa's father surrendering the teen's two cellphones, where the Secret Service discovered a video of what appeared to be a child under the age of 10 being sexually abused, the Miami-Dade warrant states. The report goes on to say that Mesa had shared the video with other other people in a group chat.
Mesa is being held on charges of charges of possessing child pornography and improper display of a firearm.
