The music teacher may spend the rest of his life in prison after hiding cameras in the bathrooms and other places of his music school to produce child pornography.
A press release issued by the U.S. Attorney’s Office on Tuesday stated that 43-year-old Philip M. Close of Rochester, New York was sentenced to 50 years in prison by U.S. District Judge Charles A. Siragusa.
He pleaded guilty to 74 charges in March, including 61 counts of making child pornography and 13 counts of possessing material containing child pornography involving preteens.
Prosecutors said that Close owned the Close Conservatory of Music on West Ridge Road in Palma, New York between 2016 and 2019, and provided private music lessons for children of all ages.
During that time, he hid spy cameras everywhere in the school, secretly recording students, parents and other teachers.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Meghan McGuire, who prosecuted the case, said that some of the cameras captured Kloss inappropriately touching his students and himself in class.
Close also placed two cameras in the school’s only bathroom, one under the toilet and one in the water cooler facing the toilet.
According to the prosecutor, he deliberately placed these cameras where young girls recorded their exposed genitals when they got up from the toilet.
Cross also admitted to hiding a camera in the bathroom of a music school where he had previously worked.
Prosecutors said they identified 61 children in hundreds of videos that Close produced between 2012 and 2019. The youngest victim was only 4 years old.
Rochester Democrats and Chronicle The report stated that Kross improperly touched 9 victims, including he kissed the lips of one of the girls.
The newspaper reported that Anne Burger, an assistant federal public defender, had demanded that Klos be sentenced to 15 years in prison and stated in court documents that he had never shared the photos with anyone.
Berg also argued that other local men accused of similar crimes were sentenced to lighter sentences because their cases were not prosecuted in federal court.
In a statement, US Attorney James Kennedy Jr. said: “Because of this sentence, this defendant is likely to spend most or all of the rest of his life in prison.
“Let this case be a role model for anyone who trusts with your child-if you try to use your child to satisfy your own illegitimate interests, be prepared to be prosecuted to the fullest extent by the law, and you may lose your freedom forever.”
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