MARYLAND HEIGHTS, Mo. — A former police officer who worked with the Maryland Heights Police Department was sentenced to four years in prison after admitting to viewing child pornography.
According to a press release from Sayler Fleming, the U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Missouri, 30-year-old Nicholas Haglof was sentenced to four years in federal prison Thursday.
The press release said Haglof admitted to viewing hundreds of images of child pornography on his laptop and cellphone in 2019 and 2020. He pleaded guilty in May to a charge of accessing with the intent to view child pornography.
According to an emergency suspension application from August 2020, Haglof was working as a police officer with the Maryland Heights Police Department at the time of the crime. A statement from the Maryland Heights Police Department in August of 2020 said he was no longer a police officer with the Maryland Heights Police Department.
The Thursday press release said Haglof will also be required to pay a $3,000 fine for each of the three victims who have been identified in the images and requested restitution. He will also be required to pay a $5,000 special assessment under the Justice for Victims of Trafficking Act.
The case was investigated by the St. Louis County Police Department Special Investigations Unit and the FBI and was brought as part of Project Safe Childhood. Project Safe Childhood is a nationwide initiative launched by the Department of Justice in 2006 to combat the "growing epidemic of child sexual exploitation and abuse."
