ORANGE COUNTY, Fla. — An Orange County second grade teacher was arrested for having child pornography and now begins the work of finding out if any of his students were his victims.
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Dale Chisena Sr. remained in jail Wednesday after his bond was set during his first appearance at $60,000. He and his 22-year-old son, Dale Chisena Jr., were arrested Tuesday for collecting child porn on their computers.
Dale Chisena Sr. has been a teacher at Lovell Elementary School in Apopka for the past 33 years. He's had hundreds of students over the past three decades. That volume is what investigators fear, because they don't know if the school should be considered a crime scene. Chisena Sr. has been suspended from his job in the school system.
"He will not remain an employee in the school district once we get the reports of all that's in there," school board attorney Frank Kruppbacher said.
Dale Chisena Sr., 58, faced an Orange County judge Wednesday. If he bonds out of jail, he wont be allowed to live with his son, he won't be able to access a computer, he's not allowed to be around any child under the age of 18 and he's bound to home confinement.
Ana Rivera's son was in the second grade teacher's class. She told WFTV she always had a bad feeling about Chisena Sr. She called it a "mother's intuition."
The Florida Department of Law Enforcement arrested Dale Sr. and his son at their Ocoee home Tuesday for possessing thousands of images of child pornography. For state agents, the arrest was just the beginning. From this day forward, investigators will try to identify the children, which is a task they admit will not be easy.
"It's going to be working with the school board, the Orange County Sheriff's Office and anyone who has any information," said Jack Massey, Florida Department of Law Enforcement.
Massey said they've already identified some victims that have circulated through porn sites since the 80s.
"Whether it was 20 years ago or last week, there is a victim. Whether these two guys knew the victim, it doesn't matter to us," Massey said.
Investigators' biggest concern is if the suspects did know the victims and they are asking all parents who had a child walk through Dale Sr.'s classroom door in his 33 years of teaching to sit down with their child and have that conversation.
"How many kids a year the gentleman has, times that by 33, how many kids are out there? We want them to come to us," Massey said.
The system is now working with state agents to make sure he didn't use a school computer to access child porn sites at work, and, like state agents, it's also working to determine if the second grade teacher acted on any of his computer fantasies.
"When something like this happens, you just cringe and pray all you're dealing with is what was on his computer at his house," Kruppbacher said.
Kruppbacher said the district is calling the parents of every child in Chisena's class. They want them to sit down with their child and report any odd behavior.
"You can't replace a child's childhood. There is no tolerance for anything like this," he said.
Dale Chisena Jr. was released Tuesday night on $50,000 bond.
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