Chef appears in court on child porn charge

ALEX CAPASSO, the chef who opened the Crow & the Pitcher bar-restaurant just south of Rittenhouse Square last year, appeared before a federal magistrate yesterday, and through his federal defender, did not contest his detention on a charge of distribution of child porn.

Capasso, 41, bearded and wearing a forest-green prison jumpsuit, had been arrested Monday at his Collingswood home. According to court documents, on July 6, he responded to an online ad posted by an undercover agent with a Washington, D.C., police-and-FBI task force.

Over the next few days, Capasso allegedly sent the undercover agent pornographic images of a girl Capasso said was his ex-girlfriend's 5-year-old niece. He told the agent he had touched the girl when she was asleep, the documents say.

He also said he has a daughter on the way with his current pregnant girlfriend and that he wants to commit sex acts with her after she is born "the very first time we're alone!!" according to court documents. And he allegedly expressed interest in traveling to Washington to engage in sex acts with the undercover's purported 9-year-old daughter.

Capasso was charged in the District of Columbia, and his case is to be heard in federal court there.

Capasso, who had previously worked as a cook at Brasserie Perrier and had opened restaurants in South Jersey, faces a mandatory-minimum sentence of five years in prison, but prosecutors said in court documents that he is likely to face additional charges for production of child porn, which would carry a mandatory-minimum of 15 years behind bars.

- Julie Shaw