Animator gets seven years in jail

PASADENA — A Nickelodeon Studios animator was sentenced to seven years and four months in prison for committing lewd acts on a 14-year-old boy and showing him pornography.

Judge Lisa Lench ordered Ezel Channel, 36, of Tarzana, to serve 16 months in prison for the molestation and for violating a previous conviction of lewd acts with a child under 14. He was sentenced to six years in prison for that conviction.

Channel, already a convicted registered sex offender, was found guilty of one misdemeanor count of inappropriately touching a 14-year-old boy and one felony count of offering to show pornography to the boy earlier this year after he was arrested Dec. 15, 2005.

The boy told police that Channel tried to show him a pornographic movie on his computer during a visit to Nickelodeon.

He was also accused of luring a 13-year-old boy and 14-year-old boy into his workplace, showing them pornography and inappropriately touching them in November 2005.

Channel was charged with two felony counts of lewd acts with a child under 14 and two counts of showing, sending or distributing harmful material.

But the jury was split on a third charge of showing, sending or distributing harmful material, and did not find him guilty of touching the second boy at Nickelodeon.

During the trial, Deputy Dist. Atty. Maribelle Estrella brought in the boys, whose names are being withheld because they are minors, to testify about Channel’s advances.

Estrella told jurors that Channel had befriended the boys and used their interest in Nickelodeon to take advantage of them.

The boys claimed that Channel touched them while he was at work and in his car, and tried to show them pornography.

But Channel’s attorney, Thomas White, denied Estrella’s arguments, claiming that she was trying to portray a sinister image of Channel. He said the boys approached Channel during a basketball game and used him to visit Nickelodeon.