[Warning: Potentially Triggering Content]
A star quarterback at the University of Florida has been arrested and charged with five counts of sharing child porn.
Jalen Kitna has played sparingly this year as the backup QB behind the Gators‘ star starter. But the team had big expectations for the freshman’s future, not least of which because he comes from a high-profile football family — his dad Jon Kitna quarterbacked in the NFL for 14 seasons.
But that’s all been destroyed by this week’s jaw-dropping news. Jalen was arrested on Wednesday in Gainesville, Florida and charged with five felony counts of possession and distribution of child pornography. At his arrest, Kitna’s bond was set at $80,000. On Thursday, he was released from the Alachua County Jail after meeting the bond requirements.
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Disturbing details are now coming out about what led to Kitna’s arrest. According to the Associated Press, officials at the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children received a tip that images of child pornography were being shared on the social media chat app Discord.
On June 23, they discovered an account with the username jjkit7#8147 had allegedly uploaded the images two days prior to that, on June 21. Cops immediately launched a “thorough” investigation, per TMZ. Quickly, they learned the account belonged to Kitna.
According to the arrest report filed with the charges, Kitna shared the photos while chatting with two other Discord users. One pic showed “a prepubescent girl being sexually abused by a man.” Another image was of “a pubescent juvenile female exposing herself as well.”
By this week, police zeroed in on Kitna’s identity. On Wednesday, they executed a search warrant at his residence in Gainesville. They seized his phone, too. On that device, per TMZ, police allegedly found three MORE “child sexual abuse images depicting two nude pubescent juveniles in different poses.” Cops claim those images were first saved to Kitna’s phone a year ago.
Disgusting…
After the QB sent the disturbing images, one user reportedly replied:
“Wait what. Dude. Are they under 18. Bruh. Nooo.”
It is unclear how Kitna replied to that call-out on the chat app. But per the AP, Kitna later reportedly told cops he thought the pictures were legal to send “because he found them online.” Uhhh, what the f**k?!
OMG!!
As the AP notes, two of the five arresting charges are second-degree felonies. The other three are third-degree felonies. While the charges “still need to be formalized by the state attorney’s office” as of Friday morning, the potential punishment is severe: Jalen could face up to 15 years in prison if found guilty.
On Thursday, Kitna’s parents appeared in court from their home state of Texas in a video call on the matter. They spoke to the judge about the charges and eventually bailed their son out of jail. ESPN reports Jalen “sobbed” from his spot in the Alachua County Jail while his father Jon and his mother, Jennifer, spoke to Judge Meshon Rawls during the video call.
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Following the appearance before Judge Rawls, one of Jalen’s attorneys spoke to the media outside the courthouse. Caleb Kenyon told reporters:
“He’s got a great family. He’s got good family support. He’s going to be well taken care of.”
Sorry, but… who the eff was asking about how he’s doing? But what about the girls in the awful images?? Just saying…
Discord has also released a statement about the matter. In a message sent to the AP, the social media platform confirmed they had already deactivated Kitna’s account “because of a violation of the terms of service.” It is unclear whether that was related to the allegations in this arrest or something previous.
Regardless, a Discord spokesperson delivered a strong statement about the matter:
“Discord has a zero-tolerance policy for child sexual abuse, which does not have a place on our platform or anywhere in society. We work relentlessly to find and remove this abhorrent content and take action including banning the users responsible and engaging with the proper authorities.”
You can see more from Kitna’s court appearance (below):
Immediately following Jalen’s Wednesday arrest, UF suspended him from football-related activities. According to an ESPN report published late Friday morning, sources in Gainesville say Kitna has now been dismissed from the team entirely following his court appearance. However, the school has yet to announce that move publicly. Maybe they’re just trying to keep the whole thing under the radar? Sounds unfortunately all too familiar…
If you have sincere cause to suspect child abuse, call the Childhelp National Child Abuse Hotline at 1-800-4-A-Child or 1-800-422-4453, or go to www.childhelp.org.
If you or someone you know has experienced sexual violence and would like to learn more about resources, consider checking out https://www.rainn.org/resources.
[Image via News 4 Jax/YouTube/Alachua County Jail]
The post Florida Quarterback Jalen Kitna Charged With Sharing Child Porn -- All The Disturbing Details appeared first on Perez Hilton.