A Tower Hill School administrator who was fired and banned from campus earlier this year after being found with child pornography also tried to solicit another juvenile, the Delaware Department of Justice said Monday.
William Ushler, 53, was charged in April with five counts of dealing in child pornography. At the time, he served as Tower Hill School’s director of upper school admissions but was fired soon after his arrest.
On Monday, he was indicted on the same five counts, as well as two counts of sexual solicitation of a child. All seven charges are felonies.
BACKGROUND:How a Tower Hill School administrator was caught with child porn — and what comes next
The state Justice Department said Monday that the additional charges came following a “post-arrest forensic examination” of Ushler’s devices. When going through the devices – the Department of Justice did not specify which ones – police “discovered communication between Ushler and another subject, who purported to be a juvenile.”
Ushler asked that person to send him “visual depictions of the subject engaged in prohibited sexual acts,” the Justice Department said. The “purported juvenile” was not in the state, officials said, and detectives said they have no information to show that Ushler had any “similar communications with children from Delaware, or children associated with the Tower Hill School.”
Attorney General Kathy Jennings called the case “extremely disturbing.”
According to court documents and previous reporting by Delaware Online/The News Journal, Ushler viewed the images using school technology.
He was sent the child sexual abuse material – a term preferred by activists to emphasize the exploitative nature of the explicit images and videos – from “unknown persons” in online chats, court records show. He would then send the images to himself using a Yahoo email. This happened about 15 times between August 2018 and March 2022 when the account was suspended, records show.
INITIAL STORY:Tower Hill School admissions director fired, banned from campus amid child porn charges
Yahoo reported the emails to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children’s CyberTipline, which then contacted the Delaware Child Predator Task Force on April 14. The task force is part of the Department of Justice and works with the Delaware State Police.
Included in the tip was the location and registration of the devices Ushler used to access the material. One was assigned to Ushler’s house in Wilmington, according to court records, while the other was registered to Tower Hill School.
Five days after receiving the tip, state police got a warrant to search Ushler’s home, including a “forensic examination” of his phone and laptop. An email from the head of Tower Hill said police also executed a search warrant at Tower Hill’s campus.
When interviewed by police, Ushler admitted to having the sexual abuse material and sending himself the images. Three images found in Ushler’s email were exploited girls under 15, while another three photos were saved on his iPhone.
It was not immediately clear Monday afternoon whether Ushler remains in prison.
Got a story tip or idea? Send to Isabel Hughes at ihughes@delawareonline.com. For all things breaking news, follow her on Twitter at @izzihughes_
