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A New Jersey deputy attorney general is charged with making AI child sexual abuse material

New Jersey Deputy Attorney General Charged With Using AI to Create and Share Child Sexual Abuse Material

by
M.A. Rothman

By M.A. RothmanOctober 16, 2026 · 4 min read
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A New Jersey deputy attorney general was arrested Thursday at his home in Bucks County, Pennsylvania, and charged with using artificial intelligence to create child sexual abuse material and sharing it online. Brian Richard Fitzgerald, 51, of Lower Makefield Township, also acquired and shared abuse material depicting real children, according to the Bucks County District Attorney’s Office.

Fitzgerald faces three felony counts: possession of child sexual abuse material, dissemination of photos or film of child sexual abuse materials, and criminal use of a communication facility. A magisterial district judge set bail at $2 million and sent him to the Bucks County Correctional Facility.

From a tip to a front door

According to the affidavit of probable cause, as summarized by the district attorney’s office, the case began when the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children forwarded a CyberTip reporting that a Discord user had shared an illicit image file on July 10, 2026. Digital forensics and subscriber records linked the account and its associated internet protocol addresses to Fitzgerald’s home.

Bucks County detectives and Lower Makefield Township police executed a search warrant at the house on Oct. 15. Investigators say they recovered prompts and scripts used to generate the material with an AI program. The district attorney’s office said chat logs recovered from Discord showed Fitzgerald, using the username “thegentlemanpervert_2160_07833,” admitting to making multiple illicit images with artificial intelligence and sharing them with other users.

The investigation also found, prosecutors said, that he obtained abuse material depicting real children through another social media platform and shared that as well. He was arrested at his home that morning and arraigned the same day before Magisterial District Judge Corryn L. Kronnagel. Bail was set at $2 million, 10 percent, meaning he could be released by posting $200,000, NJ 101.5 reported. A preliminary hearing is scheduled for later this month.

A lawyer for the state

What sets this case apart is the defendant’s job. Fitzgerald has worked for New Jersey’s Office of the Attorney General since May 2016, according to NJ 101.5, which reported that he is assigned to the Banking and Insurance section of the Division of Law and earns $138,649 a year. The outlet reported that the Division of Law employs roughly 500 deputy attorneys general.

The Attorney General’s Office acknowledged the charges in a brief statement. “Our office is aware of the charges that have been filed against an employee of the Division of Law,” it said, adding that it is “cooperating with our partners in the Bucks County District Attorney’s Office” and “taking appropriate action with respect to his employment,” according to the New Jersey Globe.

Bucks County District Attorney Joe Khan made the point plainly. “No one is above the law, least of all someone entrusted with upholding it,” Khan said. “Our office will pursue these cases aggressively and hold offenders fully accountable, regardless of their profession or title.”

“AI-generated” is not a loophole

Cases like this one tend to draw a predictable defense in the public conversation: if the images were generated by software, who was harmed? The answer is that the argument does not hold up, and the law does not accept it.

Synthetic abuse imagery normalizes the sexual exploitation of children, feeds the same online communities that trade in real abuse, and can be built from or mixed with images of real victims. In this case, prosecutors allege exactly that mix: AI-generated material and material depicting actual children, shared on the same kinds of platforms. On the same day it announced Fitzgerald’s arrest, the Bucks County District Attorney’s Office also announced the sentencing of a sexually violent predator for possessing child pornography, including AI-generated images.

Bucks County prosecutors charged the conduct as what it is. All three counts against Fitzgerald are felonies.

The presumption of innocence

Fitzgerald has been charged, not convicted. As the district attorney’s office noted, criminal charges are allegations subject to proof in court, and defendants are presumed innocent until proven guilty.

But the allegations, if proven, describe something far worse than ordinary hypocrisy. A man paid by taxpayers to represent the state of New Jersey in court is accused of producing and distributing sexual abuse imagery of children, and of trafficking in images of real children who were really abused. The tip that cracked the case came not from his colleagues or his office, but from a national clearinghouse that flags this material every day.

New Jersey’s attorney general owes the public a straight answer about how one of its own lawyers allegedly operated this way since at least July, and what it is doing to make sure nothing he touched at work is compromised.

He was paid to enforce the law for the state of New Jersey; prosecutors say he was secretly breaking the worst one there is.

Sources

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