Authorities say another Klein Independent School District teacher has been caught with child porn on his computer.
Klein Oak High School teacher Sebastian Baraldi, 55, was arrested and charged with five counts of possessing child pornography.
Law enforcement authorities reportedly found a file on Baraldi’s computer hard drive labeled “School Art Project” that was filled with child sexual abuse material.
Based on a report from the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, the Montgomery County Precinct 3 Constable’s Office said they began an investigation in January to track down who was sharing the material online, which featured images of children ages 5 to 12 years old.
Montgomery County Precinct 3 investigators, along with officers from Homeland Security Investigations and the Houston Metro Internet Crimes Against Children Taskforce, arrested Baraldi on Wednesday after executing a search warrant at his home in The Woodlands.
Baraldi was booked into Montgomery County Jail and held on a $250,000 bond but has since been released.
District officials notified parents that Baraldi had been arrested and “will not return to Klein Oak or any Klein ISD school until we learn the outcome of the ongoing investigation being conducted by law enforcement.”
Klein ISD confirmed to Texas Scorecard on Friday that Baraldi is no longer an employee of the district.
State records show that Baraldi’s teaching certificate is valid as of February 9 and he is not yet under investigation by the Texas Education Agency. School officials have seven business days to report educator misconduct to the state, although a recent study found that this doesn’t always happen.
According to his LinkedIn page, Baraldi had worked at Klein ISD as a teacher, department chair, and webmaster since 2007. He also taught social studies for the district’s International Baccalaureate program.
He and his wife have two children.
Baraldi is the third Klein ISD teacher in three months to be arrested for sex crimes involving children.
In December, Greenwood Forest Elementary School music teacher Kenneth Espree was charged with five counts of possessing child porn.
Also in December, Epps Island Elementary teacher Matthew Stegeman was charged with indecency with a child by contact following accusations that he improperly touched a 7-year-old female student.
Texas Scorecard has reported on dozens of Texas teachers charged with sex crimes involving students and other children.
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