Cedars-Sinai division director and UCLA instructor pleads not guilty to felony child porn charges

A UCLA instructor and division director at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center pleaded not guilty Thursday to charges of distributing and possessing child pornography.

Guido Germano of Santa Monica is charged with one felony count each of distribution of obscene matter and possession of child or youth pornography, the Los Angeles County district attorney’s office said in a release. Germano, 59, is suspected of distributing child pornography videos using peer-to-peer software and downloading them onto his personal computer at his home.

Germano, who was arrested on June 19 and released on bond before his arraignment Thursday afternoon at the Clara Shortridge Foltz Criminal Justice Center, is the director of artificial intelligence medicine at Cedars-Sinai in Beverly Grove, prosecutors said. Biographies that have since been deleted from the hospital’s website said Germano researched technology related to analyzing the human heart, served as a board member of three medical journals as well as professional organizations and was “widely recognized as an expert in the field of cardiovascular nuclear medicine.”

One of the hospital’s biographies that was viewable online as recently as July 16 also identified Germano as a professor of medicine at the UCLA David Geffen School of Medicine. Germano is also identified as a UCLA professor of medicine in multiple medical journals and directories.

A spokesperson for UCLA said Germano was placed on administrative leave on Thursday, after the university learned of the charges. A district attorney’s representative also said he was an instructor at the university but had no other details.

Germano faces a possible maximum sentence of three years and eight months in state prison if convicted as charged. He is scheduled to return to court on August 29. The case remains under investigation.