Child porn discovered at sexual predator rehab center in Arcadia

ARCADIA, Fla. – A rehabilitation center for violent sexual predators recently failed to keep porn away from an offender, an investigation revealed.

The Florida Civil Commitment Center, located just outside Arcadia, is a state-funded treatment center overseen by the Department of Children and Families, and owned by corporate entity, Correct Care.

The center houses convicted sexual predators like Keith Flar, 39, who was arrested and charged with 16 counts of pornography in January, after authorities raided his locker and found flash drives, SD cards, floppy disks and mp3 players, which are all illegal contraband.

The data storage devices contained almost two dozen photos of children performing sex acts, according to official documents. Flar admitted to having pornography but denied that children were involved, telling detectives he “felt that all of the videos and photographs contained adult only pornographic material,” according to his arrest report. He was later confronted with the child porn.

Flar called himself a “barber” and told Desoto County detectives, he had collected more than four years of pornographic material by bartering the files in exchange for haircuts at the center, according to his arrest report.

Flar has been at the Civil Commitment Center since 2011 following two convictions of sexual battery on a victim under the age of 12.

The discovery of Flar’s illegal pornography stash prompted a center-wide search for additional contraband, DCF said in a written statement.

“Immediately upon learning of the incident, Correct Care conducted a thorough sweep of the entire facility to ensure all the material was quickly and completely eradicated,” DCF said.

Flar is back at the Civil Commitment Center pending his criminal case, authorities said.

DCF spokesperson Michelle Glady said “a breach of this kind is extremely rare.”

But child porn has been found at the Civil Commitment Center before. In 2010, five people were arrested in separate incidents for distributing and possessing pornographic materials.

A security team at the center will determine the changes needed to prevent repeat incidents.

“Correct Care has put additional security measures in place in order to prevent possession of any future illegal material,” DCF said in a written statement.

A spokesman for Correct Care, the company who owns the facility, released a statement, saying “At this time, due to an active investigation related to your story, we will respectfully decline any specific comment on this particular situation.

“We can say with confidence that we take a great deal of pride in our professionals who go to work each day to care for a very challenging resident population. In any instance where we feel our standards have not been upheld, we act very quickly to determine the facts and identify all necessary steps to ensure those standards are upheld.”

Correct Care did not answer specific questions about how the porn and other illegal contraband was able to get inside the building.