Fraley has pleaded not guilty to all charges. Butler County Common Pleas Judge Michael Oster Jr. set bond for Fraley at $500,000. As part of the part of bond, Oster also ordered Fraley wear a GPS monitor, have no contact with any children, including his own, to have no internet access and to report twice per week to pretrial services.
He remains free on bond.
In March 2020, defense attorney Chris Pagan filed a motion to suppress evidence, including items taken from a Middletown home on Crawford Street, cell phone, computers and other electronic devices.
Pagan argued some of the multiple search warrants were not properly signed by the magistrate and relied on an uncorroborated statement from a woman with a drug addiction and a case through Butler County Children Services.
A computer believed to belong to Fraley contained “a very large amount of child pornography — over 1,200 videos depicting children engaged in sexual activity, much of which has been duplicated by defendant’s backing up the videos from his phone to his computer. The most recent unidentified backup occurred on Oct. 29 (in 2019),” Assistant Butler County Prosecutor Kelly Heile said in court documents.
The motion also says some of the images allegedly traced to Fraley’s digital payment service include sex acts involving toddler-aged children. One of the images may have been taken at a previous residence shared by a witness and Fraley, according to Heile.
A hearing was originally set for April 2020, but did not happen. A hearing was continued in progress in January, according to court records, and scheduled for Monday.
After meeting with attorneys in chambers Monday morning, Oster indicated he is still considering arguments concerning four of the search warrants and would permit the prosecution and defense additional time to document points of law.
A hearing was scheduled for May 3. A trial date has not been set.
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