Sexual Predator Wanted in Florida Arrested at Nogales Port of Entry

NOGALES, Ariz A man wanted in Volusia County, Florida on 14 charges of Possession of Sexual Acts by a Child was arrested by U.S. Customs and Border Protection Officers as he was entering the United States at the Nogales port of entry on the evening of April 5. Timothy OKeefe, a 48-year-old man from Daytona Beach, was attempting to enter the country with his wife and four children at around 7:30 pm. Officers screening people entering the U.S. queried his name and received an alert that OKeefe was wanted in Florida on child pornography charges. He was immediately taken into custody and turned over to the Santa Cruz County Sheriffs Office for extradition processing. His wife and the children were released. O'Keeefe is accused of downloading hundreds of images onto his home computer of children engaged in sex acts. The arrest capped a three-month investigation by the Computer Crimes Section of the Volusia County Sheriffs Offices Sex Crimes Unit. The investigation was sparked by a complaint to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children about a photo-sharing web site where OKeefe had posted some of the pornographic pictures. The investigation was launched in January after an anonymous tipster complained about finding child pornography on the web site. The complaint was confirmed by a Sheriffs Office computer crimes investigator, Andy Cotton, who used an undercover account to go to the web page and access the pictures. Investigator Cotton then set out to identify the person who posted the pictures along with a personal profile that listed kinky sex as among his interests. Shortly after the investigation was launched, the web site operators received a similar complaint and shut down the page and provided authorities with information that helped identify OKeefe through the IP address of his home computer. The U.S. Bureau of Immigration and Customs Enforcement and the North Florida Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force also assisted in the investigation. After identifying OKeefe, the Sheriffs Office executed a search warrant two weeks ago at the defendants home at 530 White Street. OKeefe was home at the time and cooperated with investigators, telling them they would find all sorts of pornographic images on his computers. OKeefe said he downloaded the images, but insisted that he didnt take any of them himself. Investigators seized two computers along with numerous computer disks and additional hard drives. While the computers and hard drives havent been examined, investigators have begun inspecting the contents of the disks and have already found more than 430 still pictures and videos containing children believed to be as young as 7- or 8-years-old and in some cases even toddlers engaged in sex acts. On Monday, investigator Cotton obtained warrants charging OKeefe with 14 counts of possession of sexual performance by a child, a 3rd-degree felony. But when deputies went to serve the warrant, OKeefe was nowhere to be found. The search ended at about 10:30 p.m. local time on Wednesday night when OKeefe, traveling with four children and his wife, was stopped by U.S. Customs and Border Protection as he attempted to cross the U.S.-Mexico border into Nogales, Arizona. Border agents discovered the warrants and took him into custody. OKeefe was later turned over to the Santa Cruz County Sheriffs Office and booked into the Santa Cruz County Detention Center in Nogales on $14,000 bond.