A child-pornography investigation involving a volunteer at an elementary school broadened again Friday as police identified two more victims and an additional location where they say he abused a child.
Carraway, 22, was arrested last week and charged with 10 counts of child pornography in connection with about 40 videos that show children performing sex acts. Many of the images were sent through Kik, an anonymous messaging app.
In addition to the church location announced Friday, police said that Carraway recorded or abused children in private homes, at the Glenarden Municipal Center, the Theresa Banks Memorial Aquatic Center and Judge Sylvania W. Woods Elementary School — where Carraway was a volunteer.
“If we have confirmed that there are additional locations, we’ll share that with the community in order to make sure that anyone who may be a victim will come forward,” said Julie Parker, spokeswoman for Prince George’s County police. “Perhaps the name of a location will spark someone’s memory.”
Carraway has admitted creating the videos, according to police. In some of them, he can be seen or heard directing the children to perform certain acts, police said. And in at least one incident, a student performs a sex act on Carraway in a school bathroom while Carraway records it on his orange phone, according to charging documents.
On Thursday, Fox 5 reported that in a jailhouse interview, Carraway told the station’s reporter that he had shot videos of children but had no sexual interaction with them.
Carraway is being represented by a state public defender, who on Friday did not respond to a request for comment.
In a statement sent to the media earlier this week, Carraway’s family expressed shock at the allegations against him and said they fully support the ongoing investigation and will cooperate with it.
The allegations have rocked the community of Glenarden and beyond, placing sharp focus on the school system where Carraway worked as a teacher’s aide before becoming a volunteer.
The case has also prompted two civil lawsuits against the county school board, one of them a class-action suit filed on behalf of all current and former students allegedly abused by Carraway at school.
Sherrie Johnson, a spokeswoman for the Prince George’s school system, said that school officials have not been served with the complaints in the lawsuits.
Sylvania Woods parents had pointed questions for officials at a meeting Thursday night, asking how Carraway had been hired and how he had been allowed to be alone with children long enough to produce videos on school grounds and during school hours.
Parents also wanted to know how it was possible for the school’s principal, Michelle Williams, not to have been aware of what was happening. And they asked whether Williams had been informed of Carraway’s suspicious behavior previously but failed to report it, as state law requires.
Kevin Maxwell, chief executive of the school system, said in response to parents at the Thursday session that he had many of the same questions but didn’t yet have answers because investigators’ work still is underway.
Maxwell told parents that officials have been “hearing that people did not properly report things,” and he vowed to “retrain every employee in the school system.”
He also told parents that any employees found not to have fulfilled their responsibilities will be dealt with accordingly, but he said he could not answer whether Williams will be retained. Williams has been placed on paid administrative leave “out of an abundance of caution,” Maxwell said.
Williams has not responded to requests for comment, but a representative of the principals union has said that Williams reported concerns about Carraway’s behavior to police and Child Protective Services as soon as she became aware of them.
Police have said their investigation, in conjunction with the FBI’s, could take weeks or months — a process that involves carefully interviewing children in a way that avoids further traumatizing them.
And for many families at the school — whether they were victims or not — the healing process will also be slow.
“How do we know this won’t happen again?” one parent asked school officials Thursday night. “This didn’t happen to my child, but she is scared to go to school now. How do we make her feel safe again?”
Donna St. George and Hamil R. Harris contributed to this report. Investigators ask anyone with information about this case to call 800-CALL-FBI or 301-772-4930.
