WARRENTON, Va. (WRIC) — A Charlottesville woman charged with distribution of child pornography and attempted child sex trafficking allegedly told police upon being arrested that she was trying to ‘help’ the fictitious child of an undercover agent.
Eleanor Hunton Hoppe, a Charlottesville woman most recently employed by a college aid company according to her LinkedIn, was charged in DC’s federal district court after she allegedly sent child pornography to an undercover agent and attempted to arrange for the abuse of his fictitious daughter.
Hoppe first came to the attention of law enforcement after they say she, through an unnamed “fetish website,” contacted another user, telling him that she was a mother and wanted to talk about “taboo parenting.”
Unbeknownst to her, the user in question was an undercover agent. Hoppe — who operated under the usernames “titotori” and “tori4fun” — conversed with the agent on an encrypted social media app for approximately a month in February and March of 2023.
In a criminal complaint filed in federal court, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, which undertook the operation, alleges that Hoppe “verified” her identity by sending a photo of herself giving a thumbs up next to her exposed breast — and with her face partially visible.
In March, the FBI wrote, after discussing at length the ongoing sexual abuse the undercover agent was supposedly inflicting on his non-existent daughter, Hoppe told the agent she wanted to travel across state lines to join in on the abuse.
“I can’t wait and then of course, putting her to bed and waking her up to do a few extra things will be so fun,” Hoppe wrote.
According to the complaint, Hoppe then sent the agent a 30-second video containing explicit child sexual abuse. The details of that video, and many other details included in the complaint, are too graphic for publication.
A short time later, Hoppe arranged to meet the agent at a hotel in Warrenton, Virginia along with his fictitious 8-year-old daughter. Prior to the arranged date, Hoppe allegedly said that she would bring a pink silk robe for the child, sending a photograph and writing, “Her big girl robe for tonight.”
When she arrived at the hotel on March 20, she was placed under arrest. In conversations with agents afterward, the FBI claims she told agents that she arranged the meeting “in order to help [the agent’s] child.”
According to the complaint, she also admitted to distributing child pornography, but did so only to keep the undercover agent talking.
During a search of her car, agents found a pink silk robe.
On April 4, Hoppe pleaded not guilty to the two charges against her, which could carry a sentence of up to life in prison — and a mandatory minimum of 15 years — if she is convicted at trial.
Though Hoppe motioned to be released from custody, a federal magistrate judge committed her to detention without bond.
