A Gainesville man was arrested Monday after sharing child pornography over Kik and sharing explicit images with several minors.
Vern Most Jr., 24, was arrested Monday on six counts of obscene material possession, promoting photos/movies of sexual performance by children, transmission of material harmful to minors, soliciting a child to commit illegal sexual acts and unlawful use of a two way communications device, according to court records.
He is being held at the Alachua County Jail with no bond set, according to court records.
The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children received a cybertip from Kik Sept. 10 because Most’s account was reported for sharing child exploitation material, according to the arrest report.
Most uploaded these videos to Kik and shared with other people in a private group chat on Aug. 5, according to the arrest report.
Police also received Most’s login information including his email address and login IP address.
After checking the login IP address, police found that the device belongs to AT&T and was subleased to Most, according to the arrest report.
GPD subpoenaed AT&T, which revealed the address of the subscriber to be Brenda Bucuzza. It’s unknown what her relation is to Most.
At about 8 a.m. Monday, police arrived at the apartment and executed a search warrant, making contact with Most and two other residents.
Most told police that his phone got hacked Sunday, and he doesn’t know how the explicit material got there. He said the hacker placed the explicit photos into his phone gallery, according to the arrest report.
Most also told police that in order to get into the child porn group chats, you have to send a “live” picture. He said he must’ve taken a live picture at the same time the hacker hacked his phone, according to the police report.
Most then told police he discovered someone hacked his Discord account and was talking to an underage boy, asking the boy for sexual material while pretending to be Most, according to the arrest report.
Later, Most admitted to police that he was probably the one to share the child sexual material on Kik and he was the one talking to the boy on Discord.
Most then told police he might have a second personality that he wasn’t aware of before because he doesn’t remember having those conversations on Kik and Discord, according to the arrest report.
After searching Most’s phone, police found Most had sent explicit images of himself to the boy on Discord, according to the arrest report.
Contact Jordan Ramos at jramos@alligator.org. Follow him on Twitter @JordanR68971799.
Jordan Ramos is a fourth-year journalism major who spends his time singing in two different choirs and his a cappella group.
