A 27-year-old nonprofit employee involved in an after-school program at a Moreno Valley school, where he’s suspected of sending explicit material to students, was out of custody Thursday on a $30,000 bond.
Walter Henry Harrison of Moreno Valley was arrested and booked into the Robert Presley Detention Center Wednesday on suspicion of sending harmful matter to minors. Harrison was able to procure bail on Thursday morning and was released from the Riverside jail.
He has been a paid participant in after-school programs organized by the youth education support nonprofit Think Together at Sunnymeadows Elementary School in the 23200 block of Eucalyptus Avenue for an unspecified period. The Moreno Valley Unified School District verified Thursday that he was not an MVUSD employee.
Further details on his employment history and specific position within the nonprofit organization were not immediately available.
According to the Riverside County Sheriff’s Department, Harrison came under investigation at the end of last month after a campus resource officer — a deputy assigned to security — was informed the suspect had allegedly engaged in “inappropriate contact with students.”
Sgt. Jim Peters said the case was turned over to the agency’s Special Victims Unit, whose investigators determined Harrison allegedly communicated with “at least four students who … attend the after-school program.”
Sufficient evidence was gathered to obtain and serve a search warrant at the suspect’s residence in the 14600 block of Cessna Lane on Oct. 30, according to Peters.
“Evidence was collected from the home. However, Harrison was not at the residence,” the sergeant said.
He said that deputies located him Wednesday in the area of Magnolia Avenue and Hughes Alley in Riverside, where he was taken into custody without incident.