Authorities say 76-year-old Dean Robert Garvin is back behind bars after violating his sex offender probation, picked up Friday on a Broward County warrant. Deputies transported Garvin to the Broward County Jail while investigators prepare a violation affidavit for the court.
The case against Garvin first took shape in 2025 after a cybertip from the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, reportedly triggered when Microsoft detected suspected child sexual abuse material on Bing, pointed detectives to an IP address tied to Garvin’s internet provider, according to Local 10. Coverage of Garvin’s 2025 child porn and animal sex acts charges also laid out the initial arrest and charges.
What investigators say they found
According to Broward Sheriff’s Office records and a probable cause affidavit cited in reporting, deputies who searched Garvin’s Tamarac home recovered more than 1,000 printed images of child sexual abuse material, many sorted into folders labeled "mom son," "mom daughter" and "animals," with some images allegedly depicting infants and sexual acts with animals. The affidavit quotes Garvin as saying he "had a whole lot of pictures," and it alleges he triggered a series of "bracelet gone" alarms after removing or separating himself from his GPS monitoring device and traveling out of Broward County to Palm Beach County on June 16, 2026. County court records show Garvin was convicted late in 2025 and sentenced to five years of sex offender probation, according to Tamarac Talk.
Legal exposure and next steps
If a judge finds a material violation of probation, Florida law allows the court to revoke, modify or continue probation and to impose jail time or reinstate any sentence the court could have originally imposed, and the probationary period is paused while the violation is pending. Florida statute 948.06 lays out the hearing process and the menu of possible sanctions.
How online reporting helped the case
The sequence of events in Garvin’s case is one that law enforcement says has become increasingly common in child sexual abuse material investigations: automated detection by an online platform, a CyberTipline report to NCMEC, and local follow-up by investigators. Microsoft says it proactively scans its services and reports apparent child sexual exploitation to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, and NCMEC describes how CyberTipline reports are routed to the appropriate agencies for investigation. For more on those processes, see Microsoft and NCMEC.
Garvin remains in custody pending a violation hearing before the judge who originally sentenced him, and that proceeding will determine whether his probation is revoked and whether he faces additional time behind bars. The latest affidavit and booking details are outlined by Tamarac Talk.
