A Savannah man is behind bars at Effingham County Jail on child pornography charges.

Christopher Hadel, 23, was arrested Monday night by the Effingham County Sheriff’s Office Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force. Hadel was charged with sexual exploitation of children and possession of child pornography.

"We received information that he was downloading and sharing child pornography. We traced the IP address to a residence on Buckhalter Road in Chatham County," said ECSO spokesman Detective David Ehsanipoor.

From a computer at that house, Hadel had shared images of child pornography with an IP address in Effingham County, Ehsanipoor said. The task force searched the home and found Hadel in possession of more than 100 pictures and videos of child pornography, according to the ECSO.

The Effingham County Sheriff’s Office is a cooperative member of the Georgia Internet Crimes against Children Task Force. The ICAC Task Force program was created by the Department of Justice to help state and local law enforcement agencies catch people who use the Internet, online communications systems or other computer technology to sexually exploit children.

"Protecting our children is one of the highest priorities at the Effingham County Sheriff’s Office, and we will continue to pursue these cases in the future with ICAC," said Effingham County Sheriff Jimmy McDuffie.

The program is comprised of 61 regional task forces across the nation and is funded by the United States Department of Justice, Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention. Georgia’s ICAC Regional Task Force is supervised by the Georgia Bureau of Investigation.