Ex-Pleasantville principal completes child porn sentence

A former Pleasantville High School principal who pleaded guilty to possession of child pornography on his district-issued computer was released from prison Friday.

Edward Bonek, now 53, was sentenced to eight years in prison in February of 2020, after serving about 18 months in jail. He just completed five years last month, which was the term of parole ineligibility under the plea agreement.

He will have to register as a Megan's Law offender and is subject to lifetime supervision.

Bonek originally denied he knew that the contents of the files he downloaded showed the sexual abuse of minors. Instead, he said he believed that is was adult pornography, which he claimed not to have accessed.

His attorneys appealed a judge's decision to have him held in jail pending the outcome of the case, but that was denied by the state Supreme Court.

Bonek was arrested in August 2018, after completing his first full year as principal at the high school.

He originally was charged with second-degree counts of endangering for distribution and possession of the images and video. But after it was determined that there were more than 1,000 images found, the charges were upgraded to first-degree.