Suspect in student death charged separately with child porn

This booking photo provided by the Salt Lake County Sheriff's Office shows Ayoola A. Ajayi. Salt Lake City Police Chief Mike Brown said, Friday, June 28, 2019, that Ajayi was being charged with aggravated murder, kidnapping and desecration of a body in the death of 23-year-old Mackenzie Lueck. (Salt Lake County Sheriff's Office via AP)

SALT LAKE CITY (AP) — A tech worker accused of killing a Utah college student was charged Tuesday with 19 unrelated counts of sexual exploitation of a minor after investigators said they discovered child pornography on his computer.

Ayoola Ajayi had images of children as young as 4, prosecutors said in charging documents.

Investigators took the computer as part of the investigation into the death of 23-year-old University of Utah student Mackenzie Lueck.

Ajayi, 31, remains in jail after being previously charged with murder and kidnapping in the death of Lueck. He has not yet entered pleas to those counts.

Police and prosecutors have not said how Ajayi and Lueck were connected or disclosed a motive for the killing.

A probable cause statement for the new charges doesn’t indicate any link between the pornography and Lueck.

Police have said Lueck was last seen getting into Ajayi’s car on June 17, shortly before her death. Her body was found with her arms bound behind her in a canyon 85 miles (138 kilometers) from Ajayi’s home in Salt Lake City. She died from blunt force trauma to the head.

The Salt Lake Legal Defenders Association, which has been assigned to represent Ajayi, said it does not plan to make any comments.

Court documents show that investigators searched social media and dating sites while trying to find a link between Lueck and Ajayi, including one called Seeking Arrangement, which bills itself as a way for wealthy “sugar daddies” to meet women known as “sugar babies.”

The documents don’t detail what evidence might have been found. Prosecutors have declined to discuss the findings.

Ajayi is an information technology worker who had stints with high-profile companies and was briefly in the Army National Guard.

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