A Pulitzer Prize-winning staffer at The Washington Post, awarded for his reporting on a Republican Senate candidate accused of sexual misconduct, has been charged with possessing child pornography.
Thomas Pham LeGro, 48, made his first appearance in U.S. District Court on Friday after authorities took him into custody the day before after executing a search warrant at his home.
According to a Friday statement released by the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Washington, D.C., the FBI seized several electronic devices during the search at LeGro’s home on Thursday. After FBI agents reviewed the content of LeGro’s work laptop, they discovered a folder that contained 11 videos depicting child sexual abuse material.
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During the execution of the search warrant, the agents also found what appeared to be fractured pieces of a hard drive, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office. The FBI agents discovered these fractured pieces in the hallway outside the room where they found LeGro’s laptop.
The charges of child pornography possession, announced by U.S. Attorney Jeanine Pirro, will be prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorneys Caroline Burrell and Janani Iyengar for the District of Columbia. The U.S. Attorney’s Office in Washington, D.C., also confirmed that the FBI Washington Field Office’s Child Exploitation and Human Trafficking Task Force is investigating the case.
In addition to the task force, other federal agents and detectives from Northern Virginia and the District of Columbia are investigating the case, according to the office’s statement released on Friday.
“The Washington Post understands the severity of these allegations, and the employee has been placed on leave,” a spokesperson for the newspaper told The Christian Post.
The FBI had been watching LeGro’s internet activity since May 8, WRC-TV reports.
According to LeGro’s LinkedIn page, he worked as a deputy director of video for The Washington Post. He began working for the outlet in 2000 before leaving in 2006 to work as a reporter-producer at PBS NewsHour. The reporter worked at PBS NewsHour until 2013, eventually returning to The Washington Post.
In 2018, LeGro was part of a team of reporters who received a Pulitzer Prize award for their coverage of Judge Roy Moore, who ran for the U.S. Senate in Alabama in 2017 and lost. Multiple women accused Moore of sexual misconduct, and the Senate candidate denied the allegations covered by The Washington Post.
The accusations prompted multiple GOP senators to call on Moore to drop out of the race in Alabama.
Moore claimed that he and his wife were “blindsided” by an article “based on a lie supported by innuendo.”
“It seems that in the political arena, to say that something is not true is simply not good enough. So, let me be clear. I have never provided alcohol to minors, and I have never engaged in sexual misconduct,” Moore stated. “As a father of a daughter and a grandfather of five granddaughters, I condemn the actions of any man who engages in sexual misconduct not just against minors but against any woman.”
Samantha Kamman is a reporter for The Christian Post. She can be reached at: samantha.kamman@christianpost.com. Follow her on Twitter: @Samantha_Kamman
