INQUISITR.COM / Entertainment

‘Glee’ Actor Mark Salling Indicted On Child Pornography Charges, Faces 20 Years Behind Bars

By Niki Cruz
Published on: 08:55 PST, May 27, 2016

Mark Salling has been indicted on existing child pornography charges. According to TMZ, the Glee actor was indicted by a federal grand jury on two counts of child pornography. Last year his laptop was seized by officials. His laptop allegedly contained thousands of videos and images of minors under the age of 12.

In one instance a flash drive holds images of “prepubescent minors.”

If Salling is convicted of two counts he could spend a minimum of five years behind bars and a maximum of 20 years in prison. The biggest charge against him is possessing child porn, which comes with a sentence of 20 years.

At the time of the indictment of the Glee actor, the U.S. Attorney spoke of the severity of the case.

“Young victims are harmed every time an image is generated, every time it is distributed and every time it is viewed.”

As the Inquisitr reported, at the time of his arrest he was held on $20,000 bail, which was later posted by family after a few days. He was later seen shopping for a new phone and a tablet since both were confiscated by police.

When the arrest was made in December, Radar Online spoke to Salling’s roommate’s brother, Frank Hernandez, who said that everything that was searched and confiscated belonged to the Glee star.

“Everything was Mark’s. Everything was raided in Mark’s room and taken from there and had nothing to do with my brother.

“[Jonathan] wasn’t there when it happened. He’s surprised, but I think police interviewed him and asked him a lot of questions.”

It’s said that Mark Salling was set up by one of his ex-girlfriends. His ex, who wasn’t named, allegedly tipped the cops off.

Although child pornography charges are serious no matter who it is, most were disturbed that Salling had images, because of the close association his show Glee had to children. In fact, most of Glee’s fanbase put Salling in direct contact with young teens and children because of the show’s key demographic.

Salling, who shot to fame on the show, already seems to be suffering in his career because of the charges. Since his initial arrest he was cut out of a film he was working on.

The director of said movie, Adi Shankar, made a statement about Salling’s appearance in the film.

“Today I was made aware of the serious allegations against Salling as a result of numerous media outlets hounding me as to whether he would remain in Gods and Secrets. I’m going to wait for all the facts to arrive and if in fact these allegations are true, I will immediately take action, which includes removing his scenes from the project.”

Prior to his arrest, in 2013, Salling was in trouble with the law when he was accused of assaulting his girlfriend at the time, Roxanne Gorzela. Gorzela filed multiple charges against the actor including sexual battery, intentional infliction of emotional distress, and assault and battery.

At the time Salling’s girlfriend said he forced her to have sex with him without protection. The actor denied the story later on.

Following the charges of child pornography, Salling took a two month hiatus from Twitter, and returned in March. Since then he’s been receiving a mix of messages on Twitter.

[Photo by Mike Windle/Getty Images for Bethesda]

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