New Jersey wrestling coach and state champion Alec Donovan, 26, is jailed for distributing child sex abuse images of boys as young as eight years old
- Alec Donovan, 26, was sentenced in federal court to 87 months in prison
A New Jersey youth wrestling coach and former state champion who made headlines for becoming the NCAA’s first openly gay college wrestler has been sentenced to more than seven years in a case involving images of children.
Alec Donovan, 26, of Brick, was sentenced Thursday in federal court in Trenton to 87 months in prison based on an earlier guilty plea to a charge related to distributing child sexual abuse images, the U.S. attorney’s office said Friday.
Prosecutors alleged that during the first four months of 2021, Donovan used a web-based messaging application to send three videos and receive two videos depicting child sexual abuse involving pre-pubescent children.
According to the FBI, some of the boys in the pornography Donovan viewed and sent were as young as eight years old.
Alec Donovan, 26, of Brick, was sentenced in federal court Thursday
He became a state wrestling champion nine years ago when he was in high school
They also claimed that he used the application to solicit nude photos from minors and also send them nude photos of himself.
In addition to the prison sentence, U.S. District Judge Zahid Quraishi sentenced Donovan to 30 years of supervised release, prosecutors said.
A message seeking comment was sent to Donovan’s attorney on Saturday.
Donovan, a youth wrestling coach and referee who was a former high school wrestling champion in New Jersey, was the subject of a story on Outsports.com in 2015 after publicly admitting he was gay during a college recruiting trip.
In addition to the prison sentence, U.S. District Judge Zahid Quraishi sentenced Donovan to 30 years of supervised release, prosecutors said.
Donovan (left) during one of his wrestling heydays. He is now in prison for child pornography
A 2017 story in the NCAA-published Champion magazine details Donovan’s struggles with depression in high school and his efforts to counsel other gay wrestlers.
He became a state wrestling champion nine years ago when he was in high school.
Donovan also qualified for the NCAA Division III 165-pound national wrestling tournament as a junior at Centenary University in 2019.