A new mayor is taking over in College Park, Maryland, under difficult circumstances after the previous mayor resigned in disgrace.
Fazlul Kabir won a special election last weekend, and he will be sworn in as mayor on Tuesday.
“What happened with the former mayor was very shocking,” Kabir said. “When you elect someone to a higher office, you expect some kind of higher standard, and that trust has been broken.”
The former mayor, Patrick Wojahn, stepped down in March after being charged with possessing and distributing child pornography.
Kabir, who originally is from Bangladesh, has lived in College Park for 20 years and has been a city council member there for the past 12 years.
He told WTOP that he has been meeting with residents, expressing empathy and trying to help them move forward.
“I’ve seen people crying in public meetings,” Kabir said. “There is disbelief that this kind of thing could ever happen.”
He said the whole community has been working through “complex emotions,” including “shock, anger and betrayal.”
The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children said that it contacted Prince George’s County police on Feb. 17 about a social media account operating in the county that possessed and distributed suspected child pornography.
According to charging documents, police allege Wojahn used an anonymous account to upload a variety of illegal content to Kik, a mobile messaging app, in January.
Kik then notified the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children.
Using records subpoenaed from internet service providers, police said investigators traced the account to Wojahn.
Police carried out a search warrant at his home on Feb. 28, seizing multiple cellphones, a storage device, a tablet and a computer.
“I have cooperated fully, and will continue to cooperate with law enforcement,” Wojahn wrote in his resignation letter. “While this investigation does not involve any official city business of any kind, it is in the best interests of our community that I step aside and not serve as a distraction.”
Wojahn is married to an employee of Hubbard Radio Washington D.C., which owns WTOP.
