{"id":375916,"date":"2026-07-16T20:15:20","date_gmt":"2026-07-16T20:15:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/375916\/"},"modified":"2026-07-16T20:15:20","modified_gmt":"2026-07-16T20:15:20","slug":"former-school-volunteer-accused-of-child-pornography-dies-while-charges-were-pending","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/375916\/","title":{"rendered":"Former school volunteer accused of child pornography dies while charges were pending"},"content":{"rendered":"

Benjamin Milfelt died while facing a felony child pornography charge. His cause and manner of death remain under investigation.<\/p>\n

CORPUS CHRISTI, Texas \u2014 A former member of a parent-teacher association and the WATCH D.O.G.S. program at Mireles Elementary School who was accused of possessing child pornography died this week while his criminal case was still pending.<\/p>\n

According to the Nueces County Medical Examiner’s Office, Benjamin Milfelt<\/a>, 42, died July 14. Preliminary findings were not available Wednesday, and his cause and manner of death remained pending.<\/p>\n


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Milfelt had been scheduled to appear in Nueces County’s 214th District Court for a hearing July 13. Court records show the hearing was reset, but do not list a new date. As of Wednesday, the docket had not been updated to reflect Milfelt’s death or the future status of the case.<\/p>\n

Milfelt was arrested in April after Corpus Christi police and Homeland Security Investigations executed a search warrant at his property.<\/p>\n

According to information previously reported by 3NEWS, investigators said they found child sexual abuse material on a cellphone recovered during the investigation.<\/p>\n

Milfelt was charged with possession with intent to promote child pornography involving a child younger than 18. Nueces County court records list the charge as a third-degree felony. The case was filed April 22 and remained in “pre-file” status at the time of his death.<\/p>\n

Milfelt had previously volunteered at Mireles Elementary School and served with the school’s PTA and WATCH D.O.G.S. program.<\/p>\n

Following his arrest, Corpus Christi ISD told families that Milfelt had not been on school property since before the district was notified of the allegations.<\/p>\n

Milfelt was later released on bond under several court-ordered conditions. During a May hearing, his attorney sought changes to those restrictions, including permission for Milfelt to visit the beach. A judge denied that request because children could be present.<\/p>\n

The Nueces County Medical Examiner’s Office said the death investigation remains pending.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Benjamin Milfelt died while facing a felony child pornography charge. His cause and manner of death remain under…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":375917,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[155,157,156],"class_list":["post-375916","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-corpus-christi","tag-corpus-christi","tag-corpus-christi-headlines","tag-corpus-christi-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/375916","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=375916"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/375916\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/375917"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=375916"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=375916"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=375916"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}