It’s not what Jim Romano, a father of three, wanted to find out about his neighbor.
“I can’t believe it. The guy’s living right next door to me. We have kids in our house. It’s pretty disheartening,” Romano said.
Early Friday morning, Largo police came knocking after they said an investigation found Kyle Howell, 28, had been sending and receiving child pornography.
They said some of the pictures and video involve prepubescent girls involved in sexual acts.
Romano said he caught Howell as a teenager peeping into their bathroom window.
He still lives at home with his mother.
“In a way, I kind of had a suspicion that he was a little weird. But not child pornography and stuff like that,” said Romano.
Largo police said they have a detective assigned to these type of crimes and and are part of a task force with the FBI and the FDLE.
“People involved in this type of behavior. They are going to be found out. There’s a lot of different avenues and people working against them trying to get them found. This is not acceptable in our society,” said Largo Police Lt. Paul Amodeo.
“You just have to be careful because there’s a lot of child predators everywhere. And we look on the internet and see where they are at. But we didn’t realize he was right next door to our house,” said Romano.
As for Howell’s reaction when he was arrested this morning, detectives said he acted like he kind of expected it.
He is facing 22 counts of possession and distribution of child pornography.
