Buchanan, 47, of Cabot Street in Newton, pleaded not guilty to three counts of possession of child pornography and two counts of distribution of material depicting a child in a sexual act.
Buchanan was arrested yesterday at his house, where police found a laptop with 21 images of child pornography on it. According to the police report, Buchanan admitted the laptop was his.
According to the police report, Buchanan admitted to possessing child pornography, and said he'd been using file sharing to download child pornography over the last three to five years. He said he usually deleted images every few weeks when the memory on his computer filled up.
Buchanan's lawyer, David Levinson, said that his Buchanan was being overcharged.
"Mr. Buchanan did not admit to distributing, he didn't know this file-sharing was transmitting," said Levinson during the arraignment.
Bail was set at $5,000 cash, and Buchanan was ordered to have no contact with children under the age of 18, to stay away from the Newton library, to stay away from computers, and to avoid any employment or volunteer work that involved children under the age of 18.
Levinson said that his client has no criminal record.
"These are very troubling allegations, where a city employee working in a public library was in possession of child pornography," Middlesex District Attorney Gerard T. Leone Jr. said. "Children are our most vulnerable victims and we will continue to prosecute those who harm or exploit them."
District attorney spokeswoman Jessica Pastore said the arrest was made as part of an investigation by the Internet Crimes against Children Task Force and state police with the district attorney's technology and public corruption unit.
Initially, officials characterized Buchanan as a librarian. This afternoon, a spokesman for the City of Newton said he was an "audio visual classifier,'' not a librarian. It was not clear today which library he worked at.
