Long Island Therapist Charged With Distributing Child Sex Abuse Imagery

A child therapist on Long Island has been charged with distributing sexual abuse imagery of children as young as infants on social media, according to a federal complaint.

The therapist, identified as Renee Hoberman, 36, of Plainview, N.Y., appeared in court in Central Islip on Wednesday before Magistrate Judge Arlene R. Lindsay, according to the U.S. attorney’s office for the Eastern District of New York. The judge ordered that Ms. Hoberman be held without bail at the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn, the U.S. attorney’s office said.

Federal prosecutors said that over several months this year, Ms. Hoberman, a licensed social worker who also goes by Rina, used messaging apps to upload sexually abusive images of minors, including videos of a man raping infants a year old or younger.

As recently as Oct. 16, the complaint said, she uploaded the images to several “chats” on the messaging app Kik, claiming to be a man with several young children. She described punishing the children with sexual assaults, the complaint said, and shared two videos depicting the abuse of children whom she said belonged to the man she claimed to be. She also invited another person in the chat to visit and “spank the children,” the complaint said.

Ms. Hoberman has not been charged with producing child sexual abuse imagery, and the complaint does not indicate that she was involved in the abuse.

Ms. Hoberman’s public defender, Evan Sugar, did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Her brother and father, reached by phone on Wednesday evening, both declined to comment.