AUSTIN — AUSTIN -- A former Austin firefighter is under investigation after a video surfaced on Facebook which shows him talking about paying a woman for pictures of a naked girl.
According Blanco County District Attorney, Sonny McAfee, the Blanco County Sheriff's Office and the Austin Police Department are investigating Erik Spalteholtz.
"What I've seen so far, in that search warrant, it's very egregious. The facts are horrible facts," said McAfee.
That search warrant revealed how the investigation started.
According to police, a woman traveled to the APD main headquarters to make a report, where she stated that she has had an ongoing relationship with Spalteholz for several years that has become "tumultuous" and she became suspicious of his behaviors.
Police said the woman recalled an account that occurred approximately 18 years ago when Spalteholz allegedly showed her a pornographic video that showed an adult male performing sexual acts on a girl she believed was under age, though she reported Spalteholz said the girl was 18.
According to police, she stated that she believes he is attracted to her daughter and that his behaviors made her suspicious enough to begin investigating. The woman advised that he had given her a key to his house. She said she found three SD cards there, which police reported she gave to them along with digital recordings of her confronting Spalteholz regarding child pornography.
Police reported that in those recordings, a man's voice can be heard admitting to getting into child pornography around the age of 28 or 29 -- around the time he first met the woman. He can also be heard describing an instance where he showed the woman pornography as the first time he ever saw that kind of "stuff." In another recording, the man can be heard saying he bought a girl vibrators and panties and got her to send him explicit photos of herself by pretending to be someone else online. According to the woman, this girl was around the age of 15 or 16 during this period.
A spokesperson with the Austin Fire Department confirmed to KVUE on April 28 that the man in the video posted to Facebook is former firefighter Erik Spalteholz, and police said the woman in the video is the girl's current caregiver.
Spalteholz retired from the department on April 23, according to a department spokesperson.
The video shows Spalteholz speaking to the woman, where he claims to have paid another woman more than $700 for pictures of a naked girl.
"And you knew she was three or four, and you continued to ask for her pictures," the woman asked.
"Yeah. But she only sent, like, two series of pictures," Spalteholz responded.
"And you were telling her to do what," the woman in the video asked.
"Just take pictures, like, you know, just normal," Spalteholz said. "Not do anything abusive. Not like do anything bad like that. Just take the pictures, naked pictures. No sexual acts or anything like that."
"So you're attracted to 3- or 4-year-olds," the unidentified woman asked.
"No, it was just kinda the excitement of actually it happening at one point more than anything else," the former AFD firefighter said.
"The information that I received and viewed struck me as bizarre. It started with kind of a video tape of an interrogation of the suspect in this case and that was very unusual," McAfee said.
Austin Firefighters Association president Bob Nicks told KVUE he found out about the video on April 25, two days after Spaltehoz retired.
"It's disgusting. It's absolutely deplorable conduct," Nicks said. "It's just sickening, and I hope the only good thing to maybe come out of this is that the police can identify this young lady as soon as possible and do something about this to stop it, stop her hell."
Austin Fire Chief Rhoda Kerr said in the statement that the department's Professional Standards Office opened an investigation after finding out about the video earlier in the week, but Spalteholz retired shortly after.
"His file has been turned over to the Austin Police Department as they proceed with their investigation. We will fully cooperate with law enforcement as they go through that process," Kerr said in the statement.
Spalteholz was a member of the Austin Fire Department for 22 years.
According to documents obtained by KVUE on April 30, police were granted search warrants for the three memory devices taken from Spalteholz.