Former day care monitor charged in sex with girl, 14

A former day care monitor at a Melville after-school program had sex with a 14-year-old girl he had met online and bragged about it in Internet chat rooms, a Suffolk prosecutor said Friday.

Michael Hopkins, 23, of Mineola, who in a separate case faces federal pornography charges, pleaded not guilty Friday to second-degree rape and other charges, including two counts of endangering the welfare of a child, at his arraignment in Suffolk County Court.

The charges were contained in a Suffolk grand jury indictment that was unsealed Friday.

Judge Barbara Kahn ordered Hopkins held on $250,000 cash bail. His next court date is June 21.

Hopkins - who had been free on house arrest on the federal charges, wearing an electronic monitoring ankle bracelet - was taken into custody Tuesday by federal marshals, Assistant District Attorney Laurie Moroff said.

Hopkins' attorney, Peter Brill of Hauppauge and Manhattan, said Hopkins "comes from a good family who continue to support him."

"We would ask the public to wait to see the proof before they condemn him," Brill said.

Hopkins' indictment stemmed from a joint investigation conducted by the computer crimes unit of the Suffolk police department and federal authorities, Moroff said in court. He was fired earlier this year from a program that provides after-school services to the Half Hollow Hills Central School District.

While chatting online, Hopkins shared photos and videos of children in sexual situations and "bragged about a 14-year-old girl with whom he had a relationship," Moroff said. Some of the people with whom he chatted were undercover investigators, she said.

Using computer records, authorities located the girl, a Suffolk resident who was not a Half Hollow Hills student or involved in the after-school program, Moroff said. She admitted having had sex with Hopkins, the prosecutor said. The girl was not identified in court.

According to the indictment unsealed Friday, Hopkins is accused of having had sexual intercourse with the girl on Nov. 25, 2009 - an act that occurred before he was arrested on the federal charges. Under the second-degree rape charge, a person under age 15 cannot give consent to intercourse with a person 18 or older.

Moroff said Hopkins met the girl on the stickam.com website, on which users post photographs and videos of themselves. Hopkins enticed her to perform sex acts online using a webcam and sent her a video showing sex between a man and a 4-year-old boy, Moroff said.

The indictment also charges Hopkins with two counts each of use of a child in a sexual performance and first-degree disseminating indecent material to a minor, and one count of promoting a sexual performance by a child.

In February, Hopkins pleaded not guilty to child pornography charges in federal court in Central Islip. An arrest warrant filed by an FBI agent said Hopkins admitted to viewing and trading child pornography for eight years.

There was no indication that the children in those images were from the after-school program or a baby-sitting service run by Hopkins' mother.