Former Wellesley High cross country/assistant track coach is sentenced on child porn charges

Walter Johnson, a former Wellesley High School girls cross country coach and assistant indoor/outdoor track coach, was sentenced in federal court in Boston for possession of child pornography, according to a statement put out by Massachusetts U.S. Attorney Andrew Lelling’s office.

Johnson pleaded guilty in federal court on June 10, 2019 to a single count of possession of child pornography. He was sentenced on September 10, 2019 by U.S. District Court Judge Leo T. Sorokin to three years in prison and five years of supervised release.

United States Attorney Andrew E. Lelling and Jason Molina, Acting Special Agent in Charge of Homeland Security Investigations in Boston, made the announcement. Assistance was provided by the Internet Crimes Against Children (ICAC) task forces from Massachusetts and Rhode Island, and the Framingham Police Department. Assistant U.S. Attorney Anne Paruti, Lelling’s Project Safe Childhood Coordinator and a member of the Major Crimes Unit, prosecuted the case.

In January 2017, an investigation began into child pornography being traded by a Craigslist user. The investigation led to Johnson. During a search of Johnson’s home in Framingham, images and videos of child pornography were found on his computer and on a thumb drive hidden in his bedroom. He was arrested on scene and subsequently indicted by a federal grand jury.

In April 2017 after a track meet, the Wellesley Public School system issued an announcement by email that it had dismissed Johnson. The school’s action was followed by a revelation by the U.S. Attorney’s Office that the then 69-year-old Framingham resident had been arrested and charged earlier that day with one count of distribution and one count of possession of child pornography.

At the time of Johnson’s arrest, Superintendent David Lussier emphasized that all Wellesley High employees are fingerprinted and CORI checked before being hired. Johnson had no prior criminal record.

Johnson also was a special education teaching assistant at Wellesley Middle School from 2008 until 2015, and a former Harvard University track coach from the early 1980s until 2006.