A retired Columbiana County teacher faces 75 felony charges after authorities say he possessed lewd images of children.

Sixty-eight-year-old James Watt of Columbiana was arrested Friday by the Columbiana County Sheriff and booked into the county jail. 

Police seized 18 devices from Watt based on information from a "cyber tip." When pornographic images of minors are downloaded, they're flagged for the Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force and then the local authorities are notified.

"They have subpoenas developed to figure out the physical locations for these tips, typically that's through IP addresses," Rick Whitfield, Columbiana Police Detective said. "And when they finally dial it down the area then it gets assigned to us and we carry the investigation from there," he said.

The indictment alleges that Watt possessed obscene material involving children on October 22. One count was filed for each image allegedly in Watt's possession.

Watt is now free on a $50,000 bond.

Whitfield said these cases are disturbing and what's actually happening behind the scenes goes much deeper than what's on the surface.

"Just because you're in the privacy of your own home doesn't mean that you can engage in these criminal activities," Whitfield said. "Each video or each image is a victim," he said.

Watt, a former track and field coach and STEM teacher at David Anderson Jr. Sr. high school for more than three decades, is charged with pandering and possessing obscenity involving minors.

The school's superintendent Joe Sieske said, "We don't have any reasonable record to believe any students were victimized while he was employed here...nothing in his personnel file suggested any inappropriate or criminal acts or we would have acted on it. We are very transparent and open to talking to anyone who has concerns about Mr. Watt while he was teaching there."

Watt, who is scheduled to be arraigned on January 30, at 1:30 p.m., retired in May 2024. 

According to state records, Watt had a license to teach high school science in Ohio since 1980.