Last Updated on: 11th September 2021, 03:40 pm
Who is Jonathan Newell Maryland Judge? Biography, Wiki
Jonathan Newell was a Maryland judge who committed suicide Friday morning when authorities turned up at his Henderson home to arrest him on a child sexual abuse case.
He was due to be arrested for installing a hidden camera to take pictures of naked children in his bathroom.
Jonathan Newell’s Age
His current age was 50 years.
Jonathan Newell Killed Himself
Newell’s neighbor, Kimberly Keith, posted photos on Facebook Friday that appeared to show FBI agents stationed outside the judge’s house demanding that a speaker come out.
He wrote that he heard noises he believed were gunshots followed by an ambulance.
The suicide occurred while Newell was about to be arrested for the sexual exploitation of children, prosecutors said.
He had been on court leave since the first police raid on his home on July 24, and had extended that leave to the end of the month, the Baltimore Sun reported.
Caroline County Circuit judge Jonathan Newell, 50, has been on leave since July after he was embroiled in an investigation into allegations that he had a hidden camera taking pictures of naked children in his bathroom.
When FBI agents showed up at his door on Friday morning to arrest him on a federal criminal complaint, they found him “with an apparently self-inflicted gunshot wound,” the Maryland US Attorney’s Office reported Friday. He was pronounced dead at 6:43 a.m.
“The Maryland police are investigating the apparent suicide,” said prosecutors on Friday afternoon in a press release.
What Police Have Investigated Up Till Now?
As per the copy of Friday’s unsealed criminal complaint, Maryland State Police investigators responded to a call in July about a minor who found a video camera in the bathroom of Newell’s cabin in Fishing Creek, Maryland.
Investigators interviewed two minors who said they spent “the night” with Newell on July 22nd when they allegedly discovered a hidden camera.
One of the children told investigators that after undressing in the bathroom, he found a camera in front of the shower in a small black box on a shelf in the corner of the bathroom.
After telling the other boy about the camera he discovered, the two boys went to Newell’s boat and, as per the documents, spoke to their parents over the camera in the bathroom. His parents later contacted the police.
The boy who spotted the camera also said another adult man and four children spent the night in the cabin and left earlier in the morning.
When confronted with the police, Newell denied placing a camera in the bathroom or realizing the presence of a camera and said, “Like I said, there were six other people here.”
In an interview with investigators, Newell reportedly chewed and swallowed a memory card from the camera after asking to charge his phone, then appeared to reach under the bed and grab an object with his fist, which he later placed on the bed would have.
As per the complaint, a scan later revealed that he had swallowed a foreign, possibly metallic object.
