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Dover police found that a student distributed the photos alongside “additional nude pictures of an unknown origin.”
The Dover-Sherborn school district has become embroiled in controversy after an incident involving the distribution of photos of female students at the district’s middle school.
The district first notified the Dover Police Department about the incident in September 2024, Dover Police Chief Joseph Vinci said in a statement Wednesday.
Dover police “immediately and thoroughly” investigated the matter, interviewing students and their families, notifying the identified students’ families, and searching for forensic evidence, according to Vinci.
Police determined that males students “possessed and potentially shared images of clothed middle school girls” using publicly available photos, Vinci said in the statement. They also found that one of the students distributed the photos along with “additional nude pictures of an unknown origin,” though the people in the explicit photos could not be identified.
The statement followed a Dover-Sherborn School Committee member’s claim in a letter to parents that 11 female students alleged that male students “created explicit images of them using AI technology and were sharing them with lewd messages attached,” the Boston Herald reported.
School Committee member Colleen Burt wrote in the letter that “over 100 female DS students,” particularly in the eighth and ninth grades, might be unnamed victims of potential AI-generated lewd photos, according to the Herald. Burt claimed that the police investigation had been kept under wraps and urged parents to contact them for more information.
Despite these claims, Dover-Sherborn Superintendent Elizabeth McCoy said that the matter “has been under investigation since last fall” and that some of Burt’s statements “are not factual and could be misleading,” the Herald reported.
McCoy affirmed that all parents or guardians of the involved students were notified and that support services were offered for the students, according to the Herald.
Dover police consulted with the Norfolk County District Attorney’s Office, which pursued charges through juvenile court, according to Vinci. McCoy, however, said that the case has since been “dismissed by a judge,” the Herald reported.
Burt alleged that the police investigation revealed that four male students gathered about 350 photos of female middle and high school students on Discord, an instant messaging social platform, by secretly taking them and pulling them from social media, according to the Herald. In another folder were “headless, naked female bodies and body parts,” Burt claimed.
“We take very seriously our responsibility to protect the safety and due process rights of every student in our schools,” McCoy told the Herald. “District officials have taken appropriate action throughout this process to adhere to federal, state and district policies and protocols and will continue to do so.”
Burt and McCoy did not immediately respond to requests for comment Wednesday.
“Our Department placed a high premium on supporting the identified victims and prioritizing their well-being throughout,” Vinci said. “The Dover Police Department remains committed to the safety and dignity of all — especially our youth — and will continue to work closely with the schools and families to prevent and address any behavior that threatens that commitment.”
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