Man gets probation, sex offender supervision in child pornography possession case

Lawrence Francis Cole must also report his address to state police for 15 years

An Upper Salford man avoided a prison sentence and was instead given a suspended sentence and sex offender supervision for possessing child pornography on his mobile phone.

Lawrence Francis Cole, 34, of the 1700 block of Hendricks Road, was sentenced to seven years of probation after pleading guilty to possession of child pornography by Montgomery County Common Pleas Judge Thomas C. Branca, according to court documents.

Records show Cole must also register as a sex offender with the Pennsylvania State Police for 15 years.

According to The Reporter, Cole’s attorney, Matthew Wilkov, cited his client’s cooperation with authorities, his admission of guilt, his remorse, his good employment history and his candidacy for rehabilitation as reasons for probation rather than prison.

According to the report, Wilkov told Branca that his client would be better off in therapy than in prison.

According to the report, Cole shared and uploaded child pornography of female children between the ages of six and 12 engaging in sexual acts with adult men to Snapchat, which in turn filed a report with the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children on December 16. 2021.

The user’s email address and Internet address were traced back to Cole, police said. A search warrant dated Jan. 20, 2023, led to Cole admitting to viewing and storing child pornography on his cell phone, according to the report.

“Cole stated that he was not proud of himself for looking at the files and was not sure why he was doing it,” police wrote in the complaint.

According to the report, Cole told police that he would use search engines that led him to Russian websites where he could view and download the files.

A memory card in Cole’s phone contained 16 images and one video of child pornography, according to the complaint.

All suspects and defendants are innocent until proven guilty. This story was compiled from public court records.