WASHINGTON — The FBI arrested a lieutenant from a suburban Maryland police department on child pornography charges stemming from his alleged relationship with a teenage girl and the exchange of sexually explicit photos and messages via phone texts, the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Baltimore announced Thursday.
James Cifala, 47, of the county police department in Anne Arundel, a bedroom community considered a suburb of both Baltimore and Washington, was arrested Wednesday night at the police station. He made his initial appearance in federal court in Baltimore on Thursday. He was being detained pending a detention hearing Friday.
“The complaint alleges that a sworn law enforcement officer violated his oath in an egregious manner by engaging in a relationship with a child who was more than 30 years younger,” U.S. Attorney Rod J. Rosenstein of Baltimore said in a statement.
“I hope this case will send a wake up call to parents about the need to monitor their children’s use of cellular telephones and other communication devices.”
According to a court affidavit, parents of the teenage girl contacted the FBI to report their daughter’s sexual relationship with an adult, the U.S. Attorney’s Office said.
The U.S. Attorney’s Office alleged that “FBI agents recovered sexually explicit text message conversations between the girl and “Johnny,” who has been identified as James Cifala.”
The FBI recovered images and text messages from the girl’s cell phone allegedly showing that “Cifala exchanged sexually explicit text messages with the girl and that she transmitted sexually explicit pictures of herself to Cifala’s cell phone at his request,” authorities said.
Authorities said that FBI agents executed a search warrant at Cifala’s home on January 20 and “observed furnishings that allegedly match the background of a sexually explicit photograph Cifala sent to the girl.”
If convicted, Cifala faces a mandatory minimum sentence of five years and a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison.
