A 22-year-old man is being held in the Henderson County Detention Center after deputies arrested him on six felony counts related to child sexual abuse material. Maximiliano Gomez Diaz was taken into custody without incident on charges of possessing and sharing the material, according to the Henderson County Sheriff's Office.
Deputies charged Gomez Diaz with three counts of second-degree exploitation of a minor and three counts of third-degree exploitation of a minor, as reported by FOX Carolina News. The sheriff's office said his arrest is part of an ongoing investigation and has released no other information about the case. Deputies are asking anyone with additional information about Gomez Diaz to contact the sheriff's office or submit a tip through its app.
A Pattern of Local Arrests
Gomez Diaz's arrest comes just three days after Henderson County deputies booked 34-year-old Jeffery Todd Queen on 10 counts of second-degree and 10 counts of third-degree sexual exploitation of a minor, part of what Hoodline previously reported was an ongoing CSAM investigation in the county. In June, the sheriff's office ICAC Task Force, assisted by the North Carolina State Bureau of Investigation, also arrested Shane Wesley Penley and Timothy Don Arnold on multiple counts of second- and third-degree minor exploitation, according to Catawba County News and Weather. Both men in that case were taken into custody without incident and held in the county detention center.
The Henderson County Sheriff's Office ICAC Task Force works alongside the NC State Bureau of Investigation's Computer Crimes Unit, which serves as the lead agency for the statewide Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force and coordinates with more than 200 law enforcement agencies statewide, per the NCSBI. That unit deploys 17 full-time agents across eight field districts to investigate CyberTipline referrals, according to the agency.
What the Charges Carry Under State Law
Under North Carolina General Statutes, second-degree sexual exploitation of a minor is a Class E felony carrying 15 to 63 months in prison, while third-degree exploitation is a Class H felony carrying 4 to 39 months, according to Patrick Roberts Law. The cited legal sources do not address whether defendants may claim they were unaware or mistaken about a minor's age. A conviction on either charge also triggers mandatory registration on the state's sex offender registry, the firm notes.
State lawmakers have also expanded the reach of these statutes in recent years. Effective December 1, 2024, North Carolina Session Law 2024-37 explicitly criminalized AI-generated child sexual abuse material and established an identifiable minor standard, according to BillTrack50, eliminating the requirement that prosecutors prove a depicted child's physical identity.
A Statewide Surge in Reports
The case lands amid a dramatic rise in digital exploitation cases statewide. Reports of online child sexual exploitation in North Carolina surged 1,115 percent between 2019 and 2024, according to State Bureau of Investigation data reported by WRAL-TV, an increase that has driven record referral volumes for local ICAC task forces. Nationally, CyberTipline reports involving generative AI technology jumped 1,325 percent in 2024 alone, according to annual statistics published by the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children. According to the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children, reports related to generative artificial intelligence and child sexual exploitation rose from 6,835 reports to 440,419. According to the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children, child sexual abuse material is the largest reporting category for the CyberTipline.
Henderson County courts have handed down lengthy sentences in other child sex abuse cases this month, with Superior Court judges sentencing one defendant to 22 to 31 years and another to 16 to 24 years, reflecting the severity with which local courts have treated similar convictions. Specific details about the evidence seized in the Gomez Diaz case, the scope of the digital forensics involved, or whether additional victims have been identified remain undisclosed as the sheriff's office investigation continues.
