Ocala man arrested after detectives find more than 200,000 printed images of child porn

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OCALA, Fla. (WCJB) - In January, Detective Chase King with the Marion County Sheriff’s Office was tipped that files of child porn were uploaded online. Kings said the IP address came back to 72-year-old Paul Zittel.

“The main difference in this one is that it is all in a printed physical form where is a lot of times, we’re seeing it on thumb drives or computers in a digital format.”

Sheriff’s deputies showed up to his home Thursday and found more than 200,000 printed images in his bedroom and office.

Joseph Strachan lives nearby and gave his thoughts on Zittel being arrested.

“I don’t think anyone in the right mind wants that many copies of one thing especially something that can get you in trouble.”

Investigators said Zittel would escort visitors who went into his room. TV20 asked Det. King if anyone who stopped by had suspicions about what Zittel hid.

“They were able to give us all kids of information. I don’t know if they had a suspicion of not but at the end of the day, we were able to back trace to actually who it was that finding those images online and printing them out.”

Deputies said the images were stacked in boxes and a printer on his desk showed obvious signs of heavy use.

“What I recommend for a person like that is he needs help mentally,” said Strachen.

King added that there’s been an increase in child porn cases in Marion County because cyber security officials are cracking down on what is being uploaded online.

“Always keep taps on what your kids are doing because what they can get into on the internet in 10 seconds can lead to a world and lifetime of trauma and problems.”

Zittel was arrested and charged with 25 counts of possession of child pornography.

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