HERE HE COMES AGAIN!

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Neighborhood watch: Kiddie porn possessor to be released
by Lisa Provence


Kevin Strom in a pre-arrest Wikipedia page photo.
Kevin Strom, who was sentenced to 23 months for possession of child pornography and who proudly counts himself a white separatist, gets out of prison tomorrow, and his pending residence in the 1100 block of St. Charles Court is causing some neighborhood consternation.

Filling neighborhoods with unwanted racial pamplets and papers has long been a tactic of white supremacist organizations. In this case, however, it appears someone in the neighborhood, or someone who doesn’t like Kevin Strom, may be doing the leafleting.

The Charlottesville neighborhood where Strom, founder of a now-defunct white separatist organization called the National Vanguard, will live with his mother, stepfather, and two children has been papered with fliers warning about the registered sex offender who will be residing among them.

Charlottesville Police Chief Tim Longo, who lives in that neighborhood, hopes Strom gets a fair treatment in his transition back into society.

“We talk a lot about redemption,” says Longo. “He’s served his sentence. I would hope people will not pre-judge.”

Longo calls Strom’s mother and stepfather “good people” and “good neighbors,” and he says his children play with Strom’s children, who have been living with Strom’s mother while he was incarcerated on the child porn possession charge. And Longo points out that Strom, who has been at the Federal Correctional Complex in Petersburg, will be heavily supervised during his 15-year probation.

Strom went to trial last year on charges of enticement of a minor and witness intimidation, charges that were thrown out. He pleaded guilty to one count of child porn possession, but said he’d possessed it “unwillingly,” and at the April 21 sentencing declared, “I am not a pedophile.”

His estranged wife, Elisha Strom, denies leafleting St. Charles Court about Strom’s September 3 release, but says, “Someone has to notify the neighborhood, especially since he’s still pretending to be innocent.”

The Stroms’ tempestuous relationship was revealed in court last fall, after Elisha Strom’s phone calls to police accusing Strom of kiddie porn possession, stalking a 10-year-old friend of her daughter’s and intimidation of a witness— herself— led to felony charges. She did admit to bashing Strom on the head with a telephone.

While Strom is not prohibited from being around his minor children, Elisha Strom maintains that her husband is a danger to children. “He’s in denial,” she says. “[Strom and his parents] are trying to play the victim. They’re not victims.”

Another St. Charles Court resident, who asked that her name not be used, is most concerned about “those two wonderful children living in that household with Kevin’s mother.” She says, “I can’t imagine the impact on them. I just don’t know what the publicity is going to do to those children.”