By TOM BRENNAN The Tampa Tribune
Published: December 8, 2008
http://www2.tbo.com/content/2008/dec/08/fort-myers-counselors-federal-child-exploitation-t/news-breaking/
Fort Myers mental health counselor Thomas Jackson Friedlander was described today as being either a sadistic pedophile or a lonely 78-year-old homosexual who was arrested for describing his corporal punishment fantasies.
The contrasting views were presented by prosecutors and defense attorneys as they made their opening statements in Friedlander's federal child exploitation trial.
Friedlander was arrested July 21 after traveling to St. Petersburg to meet with an undercover detective posing as a divorced father willing to share his 10- and 11-year-old sons for sexual and physical abuse, authorities say.
George Tragos, Friedlander's attorney, said the detective took advantage of his client's loneliness to lure him into the situation. He said e-mails and instant messages about abusing children was only a fantasy.
"It may be disgusting. It may turn your stomach. But it's a fantasy," Tragos told jurors. "It has to be real to be a crime."
Assistant U.S. Attorney Amanda Kaiser said Friedlander knew what he was doing.
"He arranged the meeting to sexually abuse and physically torture two boys," she said in her opening statement.
Pinellas County Sheriff's Office Cpl. Kurt Romanosky was the prosecution's first witness. He was the one who posed online as the boys' father. He will be questioned by Kaiser when the trail resumes Tuesday.
Romanosky said he first encountered Friedlander in an online chat room for strict parents in 2005. The transcripts of seven chats between the two men were read to jurors.
In them, Friedlander said he beat his son with a leather razor strop once the boy turned 11. He wrote that he often struck children he babysat.
Tragos told jurors Friedlander never had a son and never babysat.
Tragos said his client was not sexually interested in children. He said there were no suggestive pictures or online contact with children on either of the two computers that agents seized after Friedlander's arrest.
Romanosky said he gave up on the 2005 investigation after Friedlander showed no interest in coming to Pinellas County, though Friedlander did invite the detective's online persona and his children to visit him in Fort Myers.
Kaiser was about to quiz Romanosky on the 16 instant messages and e-mails he exchanged with Friedlander this year when U.S. District Judge James D. Whittemore adjourned the trial for the day.
Friedlander faces a minimum of 10 years in prison if convicted.
Reporter Tom Brennan can be reached at (813) 259-7698 or tbrennan@tampatrib.com.
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