District Attorney Gavin P. Holihan announced on May 19 a New Tripoli man is charged with using computer software to create child sex abuse material.

Reza John Mazlum, 50, is charged with three felony counts of sexual abuse of children – child sex abuse material.

An arrest warrant had been issued for Mazlum and he was taken into custody on May 11.

Mazlum waived his right to a preliminary hearing on May 18 and he is in Lehigh County Jail on $100,000 bail.

On March 24, state police received information that Mazlum had spoken with a person and shown the person images of young females wearing clothes and bikinis.

Mazlum said he had found the images on Pinterest.

The person reported this contact to authorities due to Mazlum’s living arrangements and the person’s concerns about the behavior.

Pennsylvania State Police interviewed Mazlum at his home on April 4.

During that interview, Mazlum acknowledged that he would download clothed images of children from Pinterest.

He said he would then digitally alter the images using software to remove the clothing from the images of the children.

After using the software to create naked images of the children, Mazlum said he would save the images in the photo gallery application on his cellphone.

Mazlum’s phone was seized and analyzed pursuant to a search warrant.

The phone contained numerous images of child sexual abuse material; including images that were manipulated to alter clothed images of children into nude images of children.

This case was investigated by Pennsylvania State Police Troop I Computer Crime Unit Cpl. Michael Bretzger and will be prosecuted by Chief Deputy District Attorney Sara A. Moyer.