UPDATE: Mount Pleasant city officials returned to us on Friday morning and said that this man no longer works for the city.
A former public service official in Town of Mount Pleasant, South Carolina, was arrested this week after detectives found sexual photos of children on his cell phone, according to arrest warrants.
Scott Stanley Schemmel, 48, of Goose Creek, SC, has been charged with 10 counts of minor, third-degree sexual exploitation, South Carolina Attorney General Alan Wilson announced.
According to his Facebook profile and arrest warrants, Schemmel worked for the city of Mount Pleasant.
According to an announcement that was apparently deleted (so it is blurred), Schemmel worked for the infrastructure division of the utility department as a team leader.
“The investigators received a CyberTipline report from the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC) that took them to Schemmel,” said Wilson’s office in a press release.
According to FITSNews arrest warrants obtained on Thursday, a Mount Pleasant detective received a call from Homeland Security Investigations on August 7 “in reference to an ongoing investigation involving child sexual abuse material” involving Schemmel.
The agent met Schemmel in his work truck in Town of Mount Pleasant, in the SCDMV parking lot, for an interview, where he signed a consent form for the police to search his phone, according to arrest warrants.
When investigators performed a forensic review of Schemmel’s phone, they discovered sexual images of children in the phone’s trash, according to police reports.
The images found on his phone were of naked girls between the ages of 2 and 10, according to arrest warrants. In some of the photos, the girls were in sexual positions on the bed and others on the beach. The police also discovered the image of a 4 to 6-year-old child “with his face turned to an adult male penis erect in his mouth,” according to arrest warrants.
Wilson’s office said in the statement that the material was referred to as “child sexual abuse material” instead of “child pornography” because
“Pornography” may imply that the child was a consenting participant. “
The investigation took place within the city limits of Town of Mount Pleasant. Schemmel lived in an apartment on Cranford Road in Goose Creek.
Schemmel faces up to 10 years in prison for each of his 10 criminal charges. According to the records of the Charleston County Courthouse, his bail was set at $ 15,000 on Wednesday on condition that he did not contact the victims.
This week, Wilson’s office announced the arrest of two other men on charges of exploiting a child.
These arrests include:
- Kealon Tyler Howard, 25, from Charlotte, NC, charged with a criminal solicitation charge for a minor and an accusation of disseminating obscene material to a person under the age of 18.
- Matthew Carl Williamson, 33, of Ware Shoals, SC, a minor, second-degree sexual exploitation charge.
FITSNews also obtained Howard’s arrest warrant. Howard is accused of sending a video of his penis to an 11-year-old boy while in Rock Hill, South Carolina, according to the statement. Howard is also accused of sending messages to the 11-year-old boy “for the purpose of or with the intent to persuade, induce, seduce or coerce” the victim to have sex with him. He was 24 at the time of the incident.
All three cases will be heard by the Attorney General’s Office.
“Attorney General Wilson emphasized that all defendants are presumed innocent, unless and until they are found guilty in a court of law,” Wilson’s office said in the press release.
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On Thursday, FITSNews obtained arrest