Prior To Expected Guilty Plea, Mom Calls Preschool Teacher Case 'Sickening'

DENVER (CBS4)- With former Paddington Station preschool teacher and administrator David Moe expected to plead guilty Thursday to child porn charges, the mother of one of his students is speaking out calling the situation "sickening ... very disturbing."

In July, 2012, federal agents arrested Moe at his home after tracing large amounts of child pornography to his home computer. Moe had been employed at Denver's Paddington Station preschool for 18 years.

According to an arrest affidavit in the case, "He admitted that he used the peer to peer program and the Internet to make available, trade, and collect images of child pornography. Mr. Moe stated that he has lots of sexually explicit images, approximately 10,000 and estimates that two percent depict children under the age of 18. Mr. Moe's preference is to look at sexually explicit images depicting females ages four and older."

After finding 500 DVDs and CDs at Moe's home, he was arrested and subsequently charged with distribution and attempted distribution of child pornography and possession of child pornography. He is expected Thursday to change his plea to guilty. His attorney has not responded to inquiries from CBS4.

"I would rather see a trial, rather see him sit there and face this. Him pleading guilty, he is taking the easy way," said one Paddington mother who asked not to be identified so her daughter at Paddington would not be identified.

"He had in his possession a huge amount of child porn. It's sickening," said the woman.

She said on several occasions Moe pulled her daughter out of classrooms so he could take photos of her in various costumes.

"I don't know if he was using the photos for something or what he was getting. It petrified her."

She said her daughter is now in therapy.

"It is a nightmare, it's very disturbing."

The woman and other Paddington parents are hopeful that a guilty plea and eventual sentencing would mean an 800-page journal Moe kept of his years at Paddington would be released.

"I want to know if she is in there, if he wrote about her and what were his thoughts writing about her. I really want to see what's in that journal."

But that seems unlikely, at least in the near future.

In a statement to CBS4, a spokesman for the U.S. Attorney's Office Jeff Dorschner wrote, "The defendant's journal continues to be evidence in a criminal proceeding. Evidence in a criminal proceeding generally is not made publicly available while the proceeding remains pending. At the conclusion, the notebook would not be released as a matter of course. At that point, whether there is any future public or private access to the notebook would depend on the specific nature and legal basis for any future request."

If convicted Moe could face numerous years in prison.

- Written by Brian Maass for CBSDenver.com