Media Release

Wilmington – Attorney General Beau Biden announced today that a Child Predator Task Force undercover investigation resulted in the arrest of a Delaware student for soliciting a detective posing as a child for sex.

“We created the Child Predator Task Force to use technology to find predators in the places where they target kids and take them off the streets before they can harm children,” Attorney General Biden said. “I’m proud of the work they’re doing every day to keep our families safe.”

An undercover detective with the Child Predator Task Force, posing online as a 13 year-old girl, was contacted by 26 year-old Christopher D. Ginelli. During multiple online chat sessions Ginelli solicited the fictional girl to meet and have sex with him. As a result of the investigation, detectives determined that Ginelli was communicating from Widener University School of Law, where he was a 3rd year law student. On Thursday, May 9 the Child Predator Task Force executed a search warrant at Ginelli’s residence at the University’s Shipley Hall Dormitory on Concord Pike in Wilmington, where they seized a laptop computer and other digital media. Detectives arrested Ginelli, age 26, of Lakewood, NJ, and charged him with four counts of sexual solicitation of a child. He was arraigned by video phone and was ordered to be held on $60,000 secured bail. He subsequently posted bail and was released from the James T. Vaughn Correctional Center.

Widener University cooperated fully with the Task Force and assisted in the criminal investigation.

The investigation, including a complete forensic analysis of the evidence, continues. A booking image of Ginelli is attached.

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