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By Matthew Russell Lee, Exclusive Patreon

SDNY COURTHOUSE, Nov 14 – A thirty year old man accused by the government of distributing pornographic images of infants and bragging that he was grooming an 11 year old boy had been freed on bond to his mother's house in Freehold, New Jersey, as exclusively reported by Inner City Press.

  On September 3 Bryan Pivnik's pre-trial freedom was ended by U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York Judge P. Kevin Castel.

 And now the trial is coming, set for January 28, 2020. On November 14 with in the courtroom gallery Pivnick's mother and step-father, Inner City Press and the mother of the child at issue, Judge Castel denied Pivnick's motion to suppress his pre-arrest statement. Judge Castel said there was no way Pivnick, in his own apartment, was subject to a custodian interview requiring the reading of Miranda rights.

  Then Judge Castel denied Pivnick's notion concerning his phone, find among other things exigent circumstances: Pivnick could have deleted the Telegram app on his phone. (This happened recently in a 911 health care information fraud mass indictment: a defendant asked for his phone to look for a contact, and deleted his WhatsApp and all the messages on it).

  So now, the trial. Inner City Press will continue to cover this case.

   Back on September 3, Pivnik arrived for a pre trial conference, as in July, in a blue blazer accompanied by his mother and step father. His lawyer Matthew Myers had filed a motion to suppress his cell phone with child pornography and boasts of grooming on it. Myers asked that the government not respond yet to his motion, since he has a mitigation brief pending.

  Then it turned. Pivnik has tested positive for meth, five days after the last conference in the case at which as on September 3 Inner City Press was the only media present.

  Myers tried to focus on the chain of custody of Pivnik's urine, sent to an outside lab after the person administered the test found that the sample was cold, and not as expected warm.

  Judge Castel grew frustrated at the urine argument, and then began to ask about the underlying complaint, which Inner City Press covered at the time of presentment in the SDNY Magistrates Court. Pivnik bragged he was grooming the 11 year old brother of his boyfriend James.

  Myers, perhaps sensing the danger to his client, said that James' mother Geraldine Chapman was at the presentment in the Mag Court. That was true - but as Inner City Press remembers is, Ms. Chapman while praising Pivnik for his work on a musical drama said she would never again allow her younger son to see him.

  As Judge Castel read from the complaint, including interpreting "hee hee" as a devilish laugh, an SDNY Court Security Officer came in, then another. Clearly, remand was now a possibility.

  Finally Judge Castel asked for final arguments from Assistant US Attorney Thomas John Wright, who asked for remand, and Myers, who said he had no more to say.  Then after a silence in which Castel flipped through papers, the decision was reached: remand.

 The two Court Security Officers surrounded Pivnik. As another case, that of Craig Smith represented by Bennett Epstein, was called the CSOs allowed Pivnik to hug his mother, who was crying. He sat in the back until two U.S. Marshals arrived. He took off his blazer.

 More on Patreon here.

  On May 30 Bryan Pivnick was brought in foot shackles before SDNY Magistrate Judge James L. Cott after 6 pm. Assistant US Attorney Thomas Wright, who later confirmed the spelling of Pivnick's name to Inner City Press, argued for detention.

  He described Telegram messages on February 10, 2019 in which Pivnick said he was "getting close to the 11 y/o bro" of his boyfriend. The same 11 year old was found in Pivnick's apartment when he was arrested.

  Now on May 31, with requests to various authorities unanswered, there is this from the now public complaint: Bryan Pivnick is also known as "magnapraeda." FBI Agent Matthew Deragon swore, before Judge Cott agreed to free Pivnick, that he had found on Pivnick's cell phone images of penetrated infants in diapers, also a male child one to three years old.

  The full quote alluded to on May 30: "I'm trying to get close to a buddy's 11yo bro [devil emoji]." He then told another now incarcerated "User-2" that "I'd love to share." They confirm Pivnick lived in Manhattan - see Patreon.

  Pivnick's Federal Defenders lawyer Philip Weinstein protested that the 11 year old is the son of Pivnick's boyfriend and that the photos were not naked - they were at a museum. "The SPY museum," Pivnick audibly said.

  Pivnick's mother and step-father were in the gallery. When Pivnick was brought in his mother cried and left courtroom. Later she spoke up to tell Judge Cott that her home in New Jersey has "Raid security" which can film whomever approaches it.

   Judge Cott said he would take a recess to decide. But before that happened, none other than the mother of the 11 year told, a Ms. Chapman, spoke up from the gallery. She said that while she will never again allow her son to see Pivnick, they had shared a dog together, that she had paid for.

  She objected to AUSA Wright saying Pivnick doesn't have steady work, noting that he works 11 hours a day on a musical, albeit not for money.

  While Cott and his Deputy Mr. Tan never read out the index number of the case, online research by Inner City Press found a Bryan Pivnick who is described in Marymount Manhattan Magazine in 2010-11: "Early this spring semester, Bryan Pivnick ’11 brought the beginnings of a song to class. He wasn’t sure where he was going with it, but wanted to get some feedback to help guide him. Students reacted with confusion to his phrasing and were unsatisfied with his rhyme schemes. In a previous class, Pivnick, a theatre arts major, had received favorable responses from the class when he shared a song from a separate project, a developing musical in which he had provided the class with clear characters and context for the direction those songs were taking."

  Bryan Pivnick also registered with GoDaddy a website named TheDramatistsLab.org.  It is not live. An address on the Upper West Side is also listed but no longer seems relevant for this format. (But see Patreon, here.)

   Cott emerged and said that, unlike a homeless man less than an hour later whom he remanded to the MCC for online threats to DC Mayor Muriel Bowser, of whom Pre Trial Services noted "ties to Nigeria," Pivnick could be freed. His mother will put up her home and agree to have her computer and other electronics password protected. Pivnick is not to see the boyfriend, who is now a witness. In the back of the Mag Court, Ms. Chapman was discussing what was on Pivnick's phone. Then the homeless man was remanded, his bond application denied.

The next hearing for Pivnick is in September.  Inner City Press and @SDNYLIVE were and will be there.

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