Yorktown Man Sentenced to Prison for Criminal Sexual Abuse
A registered sex offender from Yorktown was sentenced in Putnam County Superior Court last week to two consecutive prison terms for sexual abuse of children.
Jonathan DeLaura, 39, who was sentenced last month to 35 years in federal prison on child pornography charges, will spend an additional two to eight years behind bars for a crime spree that began just days after being released from prison in April 2011 following a probation violation for a previous child sexual abuse conviction involving a 12-year-old boy.
“Crimes against children are especially heinous, and Jonathan DeLaura is a textbook example of how sex offenders operate,” said Putnam County District Attorney Adam Levy. “By working closely with our law enforcement partners, we were able to identify additional victims, gather information about additional crimes, and ultimately secure a stronger sentence that will keep this man behind bars and away from children for a very long time.”
Putnam officials said DeLaura had victims in three states and would pose as a young female online, using blackmail and emotional manipulation to force them to submit to his demands.
In December 2012, DeLaura pled guilty in Putnam to two counts of criminal sexual acts. In April 2013, he pled guilty in federal court to receiving and distributing child pornography, possessing child pornography, and transferring obscene material to victims while a sex offender.
A former youth tennis instructor in Putnam County, DeLaura was required to register with the New York State Sex Offender Registry, distributed files containing images and videos of child pornography over the Internet via a Peer-to-Peer networking program.
According to Preet Bharara, the United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York, DeLaura contacted a 15-year-old boy in November 2011 in an Internet chat room using the screen name “sillyrabbit” and claimed to be a 17-year-old girl. He later sent obscene photographs to the victim.
DeLaura was arrested on February 2, 2012 by the Putnam County Sheriff’s Office and a search warrant executed at his residence revealed an iPod that contained approximately 162 videos containing images of child pornography and approximately five still photos of images containing child pornography.
Following that arrest, another victim disclosed repeated sexual abuse by DeLaura in 2010 that began when the victim was 14 years old and DeLaura was the victim’s tennis instructor.
Rick has more than 40 years’ experience covering local news in Westchester and Putnam counties, running the gamut from politics and crime to sports and human interest. He has been an editor at Examiner Media since 2012. Read more from Rick’s editor-author bio here. Read Rick’s work here: https://www.theexaminernews.com/author/pezzullo_rick-writer/
