BELOIT — A Beloit man will be evaluated before his change-of-plea hearing next month in a federal child pornography case.

A lawyer for Matthew S. Bartchy, 28, of Ellett Road in Beloit, participated in a phone conference Monday with prosecutors and U.S. Judge Daniel Nugent of Northern Ohio District Court. Nugent scheduled another hearing for March 15 when Bartchy is expected to plead guilty of attempted sexual exploitation of children and receipt and distribution of child pornography, federal court records show.

Bartchy was first charged in March 2022 in Mahoning County Area Court in Sebring with 10 counts of pandering sexually oriented matter involving juveniles and several other sex offenses, according to Mahoning County court records. The Smith Township Police Department filed the charges, court records indicate. Those charges were dismissed after the federal case was begun.

A federal affidavit written by Julie Bevilacqua, a Cortland police officer who also works as an agent with the Mahoning County Sheriff’s Office and Mahoning Valley Human Trafficking Task Force, states the task force obtained information regarding “child exploitation material” being uploaded to various platforms such as Instagram from an account connected to Bartchy.

The allegation was that more than 70 files involving child pornography were uploaded between Dec. 24, 2021, and Jan. 26, 2022. Some 15 of the files viewed by authorities “depict files of child pornography,” the affidavit states.

The case involved an FBI agent working in Missoula County, Mont., and posing undercover as a 13-year-old girl. The agent said he heard from a person on Instagram stating that he or she was a 14-year-old girl. The person sent the agent images of a young girl in sexual situations. The purported 14-year-old girl, through an Instagram account, asked the agent to send similar images.

In February 2022, records for the Instagram account, which was traced to Bartchy at his Smith Township home, showed more than 1,000 images and videos, many of them depicting minors engaged in sexually explicit conduct.

Mahoning County Area Court Judge Joseph Schiavone approved a search warrant March 14 for Bartchy’s home, when agents seized a laptop and arrested Bartchy. In interviews with federal agents, the defendant later admitted to having numerous online conversations with juvenile females, requesting nude photos from them and soliciting minors to have sex with him, the affidavit states.

Bartchy has been held without bond in Mahoning County jail since his arrest.

gvogrin@tribtoday.com