Fernando Rivas is a Grammy Award winning composer who worked on ‘Sesame Street’ but he won’t be getting any gigs around children anytime soon. Rivas has been charged with making and distributing child pornography including handcuffing a 4-year-old girl, naked, and taking pictures.
The former fine arts instructor at a private school in Charleston pleaded not guilty Monday to making child pornography.
Rivas, 59, also pleaded not guilty to using a computer to send the images across state lines and possessing child pornography images in April 2011.
Federal prosecutors said that in 2010 and 2011, Rivas coerced a person under the age of 18 to engage in sexually explicit conduct for the purpose of taking pictures. FBI agents raided the composer’s home and, according to court docs, the feds claim they discovered a collection of photographs including ones depicting a 4-year-old girl naked and ‘restrained in handcuffs and other bondage-type devices.’
Rivas posted 10 percent of a $300,000 bond and was placed on house arrest except for work or other court-sanctioned outings. He was also ordered not to have contact with the alleged victim, not to access the Internet or be around any children without supervision.
Neither Rivas nor his attorney have any comment.
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