Last Updated: Thursday, Dec. 17, 2015 at 1:30 p.m.
A Mat-Su man who, according to troopers, hindered the efforts of crews battling the Sockeye Fire in June by not letting them onto his Willow property was arrested Wednesday on child porn charges.
Scott Leitner, 50, of Houston, was arrested around 10 a.m. Wednesday “without incident” after Alaska State Troopers served a warrant at his Phido St. home in Willow, according to an online trooper dispatch
As first reported in the Mat-Su Valley Frontiersman, Leitner was arrested on charges of possession and distribution of child porn. An investigation into Leitner’s online activities was initiated after authorities in Alaska were alerted by the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC) in mid-November.
“NCMEC notified the Alaska Internet Crimes Against Children Taskforce (ICAC) and the ABI Technical Crimes Unit that a suspect in Houston, AK was distributing images of child pornography across the Google email network,” AST spokesperson Megan Peters wrote in an email Thursday.
According to court documents, more than 190 pornographic images were obtained by investigators.
Leitner was taken to the Mat-Su Pretrial Facility and held on $5,000 bail with a third-party custodian required for release.
Troopers originally made contact with Leitner on June 17 and gave him a warning for “recklessly creating a hazardous condition for firefighters in the area denying them access to his property where an active fire was occurring which was also threatening neighboring properties,” according to an online dispatch posted at the time.
He was subsequently served a misdemeanor citation for disorderly conduct on June 20 after he reportedly continued to prevent firefighters battling the Sockeye Fire from entering his property.
