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Federal prosecutor addresses
fellow counselors' warnings about
behavior with young campers.

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federal prosecutor says it
is "extremely likely" that
former Jewish Community
Center day camp counselor Matthew
Kuppe had some form of sexual con-
tact with campers during the sum-
mers of 2014 and 2015.
This statement was made in a
23-page document filed by Assistant
U.S. Attorney Sara D. Woodward
in response to a motion by Kuppe's
attorney requesting his release on
bond pending trial.
The government document also
referred to statements from several
counselors who worked with Kuppe
in 2015, describing his behavior
around the younger kids as "over the
top." Woodward
called Kuppe's
alleged behavior
"insidious and dif-
ficult to detect,"
adding the danger
he posed "is much
more severe than
the average child
Matthew
pornography defen-
Kuppe
dant" because he
gained access to his
victims, groomed them, took explicit
photos and posted them online,
and admitted under questioning he
became aroused when he touched the
genitals of a 5-year-old boy, which he
said happened accidentally.
In addition, according to the
document, federal investigators found
numerous photos of boy campers
from 2014 that Kuppe allegedly had
taken and emailed to himself. One of
the photos was focused on a camper's
clothed crotch; the boy didn't appear
to know he was being photographed.
The motion was the second request
from defense attorneys Walter
Piszczatowski and Michael Rex of the
Bloomfield Hills-based Hertz Schram
law firm asking the court to release
Kuppe to the custody of his parents,
Richard and Linda Kuppe. The par-
ents work from their West Bloomfield
home and promised to monitor their
son's activities around the clock.
The first motion was denied at a
detention hearing on Aug. 18, where

U.S. Magistrate Judge Elizabeth A.
Stafford ruled that Kuppe should
remain in custody because he posed
a danger to the surrounding com-
munity and his parents could not
effectively supervise him 24 hours a
day given his previous actions and
proclivity for deception.
At the Aug. 18 hearing,
Piszczatowski related Kuppe's admi-
rable qualities to the court, which
included being a devoted son and
honor student who did not use
drugs or abuse alcohol and who had
received numerous accolades dur-
ing his three years at Michigan State
University, where, as a psychology
major, he was chosen over hundreds
of students for a coveted internship in
family therapy.
Piszczatowski also said there was a
difference between child pornography
and "child erotica;' and that it had not
been established which category best
suited the images posted by Kuppe.
In her brief, Woodward provided
details about how Kuppe was alleg-
edly able to take sexually explicit
pictures of young boys in the locker
room during a camp overnight by
volunteering to help out with the
younger campers even though he was
officially an assistant unit head in the
Trekkers group, which consisted of
middle school-aged children.
According to the brief, Kuppe
posted nude photos of three 5-year-
old JCC campers on a Russian web-
site where he had an account, a site
known by law enforcement to be fre-
quented by individuals with an inter-
est in child pornography.
The brief alleged Kuppe had identi-
fied one of the boys by his real name
in an album he titled "Five Year Old
Jewish Boy:' In emails exchanged
between Kuppe and an undercover
federal agent posing as a user of the
site, Kuppe offered to exchange addi-
tional photos in exchange for other
pornographic materials, according to
the allegations.

Complaints Made

The document also addressed why
the JCC may have hired Kuppe to
return in 2015, despite complaints
from other counselors about his inap-
propriate behavior during the sum-

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