Cobb police arrest State Senate research head on child porn charges
Aug. 4—The head of the Georgia State Senate Research Office has been arrested on child pornography offenses by Cobb police.
Alexander Azarian, 52, was charged last week after police say they searched his Smyrna home and located child pornography on his cell phone.
Azarian first came to the attention of authorities in February 2021, according to his arrest warrant, when Yahoo notified the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children about an email address sending and receiving the materials. Yahoo reported the activity went as far back as 2007.
Police obtained a search warrant for Azarian's house after the IP address tied to the emails was traced to his home address.
During the July 28 raid, police said Azarian admitted he owned the email address, but asked for a lawyer when questioned about the child pornography. Sexually explicit images of minors were found on his cell phone, the warrant alleges.
Azarian faces one count of sexual exploitation of a child and one count of distribution of child pornography, for allegedly sending the images to another person. He is currently out of jail on a $70,000 bond.
