Orlando baseball coach arrested on child porn charges, officials say
ORLANDO, Fla. - Orlando police officers have arrested a youth baseball coach accused of using Twitter to share hundreds of images and messages involving child pornography.
Timothy Daniel Shea, 45, was booked into the Orange County Jail on 10 counts of possession of material depicting sexual performance by a child and unlawful use of a two-way communications device. Shea's arrest comes after a nearly one-year investigation, authorities said.
Officials said The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children received a cyber tip in May 2020 from Twitter that one IP address had generated 3,000 pages of explicit direct messages, 2,000 tweets with explicit images, and one upload of an image depicting the sexual performance by a child.
Police say the IP address was identified as Shea’s residence in the 3500 block of Fairway Lane.
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"This is also the registered address for his business, The Tribe Baseball Club, a traveling team for teens," officials said.
Officers said through their investigation, they uncovered more disturbing evidence.
"In Shea’s Dropbox account, detectives found multiple images of child pornography. Also, his cell phone contained 3,400 chats discussing ways to sexually abuse children and also have sex with them. Shea also solicited personal items from other users in online chats, including underwear that detectives discovered were being sent to his P.O. Box," according to the Orlando Police Department.
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Police said they located hundreds of clear baggies containing individually stored and previously worn underwear, which appeared to possibly belong to women and girls.
At this point, investigators said there is no evidence that children depicted in videos Shea allegedly had in his possession were known to him. However, the lead detective on the case wants parents to talk to their children.
"This case concerns me because he’s not just some guy in a basement that doesn’t have times to the community or anything like that. He’s, you know, people trust him. He’s a baseball coach. People know him so it’s one of those concerning moments there’s a possibility there’s other victims out there," said Orlando Police Detective Jennifer Wing.
Shea is out of jail on a $27,000 bond. Parents with concerns should call the Special Victim’s Unit at 407-246-2970.
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