Christopher Gempp, age 36, of Derry

NASHUA – A Derry resident listed as a teacher at a Rockingham County middle school, and a one-time music director for a kids’ summer theater camp, has been charged by Nashua police with felony offenses accusing him of communicating online with a person he thought was a child.

Police said detectives have been investigating Christopher Gempp, 36, since April, after developing information that he was allegedly involved in the “sexual exploitation of children on the internet,” according to police.

The website for Timberlane Regional Middle School in Plaistow lists Gempp as a technology instructor at the school, which includes children from Sandown, Danville and Atkinson as well as Plaistow.

In 2017, according to news sites, Gempp was the director of “Hack-ma-Camp,” a four-week summer camp for children ages 7-13 hosted by the historic Hackmatack Playhouse in Berwick, Maine.

Regarding Gempp’s arrest, police didn’t say where, or under what circumstances, he was arrested, other than saying members of the department’s Problem Oriented Policing (POP) Unit took him into custody shortly before 4 p.m. Wednesday.

He is charged with one count each of certain uses of computer services prohibited, and attempted felonious sexual assault, both Class B felonies.

Gempp was booked and initially held on $5,000 cash or surety bail pending arraignment on Thursday. But he subsequently made bail, at which time Thursday’s arraignment was continued to a future date.

Police said detectives investigated Gempp in partnership with the Internet Crimes Against Children (ICAC) Task Force, with which the department is affiliated.

The task force works with local police agencies “to combat child exploitation in New Hampshire,” police said.

They ask that anyone with any additional information on the case contact police on the department’s Crime Line, 589-1665.

Also, anyone wishing to anonymously report cases of child exploitation can call the Crime Line.

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Dean Shalhoup may be reached at 594-1256 or dshalhoup@nashuatelegraph.com.

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