The Tribune recently obtained internal investigative reports from the Navajo County Sheriff’s Office that reveal new details in the case against Molly Kathryn Ottman, 50, a former private investigator.
At the time, Ottman was working for Harter Investigations, who was hired by the Brooks family in Joseph City to assist in the search for Jarrett Brooks, their then 16-year-old son who disappeared after walking away from the family home July 4, 2023, and Ottman was actively involved in the search. She became a key source of information for law enforcement after she had provided screenshots of sexually explicit Reddit posts she claimed to have unearthed and were linked to Brian Brooks. The content of the posts portrayed deviant behavior involving children. Ottman alleged she had accessed these posts through the Reddit account “fireguy2201,” which law enforcement confirmed was used by Brian Brooks.
On Oct. 2, 2023, Ottman emailed a member of the sheriff’s office stating that she believed her employer, James Harter, was attempting to profit from the search for Jarrett and referred to the effort as a “money grab.” Around that time, Harter was also speaking to the sheriff and reported receiving numerous complaints about Ottman from individuals in both Navajo and Apache counties. Harter expressed concern about the disruption she was causing to his business and informed detectives on Oct. 16, 2023, that he had terminated her employment and revoked the private investigator license he had helped her obtain.
Following her dismissal, Ottman allegedly began targeting Harter online using fake social media accounts. Two weeks later, Harter obtained a restraining order against Ottman and just days after that, he filed a report with the Phoenix Police Department alleging judicial interference.
The critical shift in the sheriff’s investigation occurred when detectives received confirmation from Reddit that the posts Ottman submitted were not associated with “fireguy2201” but with a similar-looking account, “fireguy2201-.” Initially, law enforcement believed the dash at the end of the name could have been an internal Reddit marker for a deleted account. However, further communication with Reddit confirmed “fireguy2201-” was a distinct, user-created account.
Investigators then traced the Reddit and Gmail accounts used to create fake Reddit account to IP addresses. Warrants served to Google and Frontier Communications linked those addresses to Ottman’s residence in Linden. Frontier confirmed that both IP addresses used to create those accounts belonged to Ottman.
The fabricated Reddit content became the basis for several warrants executed on Jan. 3, 2024. Searches were carried out at the Brooks family residence, their vehicles, the Joseph City Fire Department and Harter Investigations’ offices and the home of James Harter, as it was indicated that Harter had knowledge of the information in the Reddit account and withheld it from law enforcement. Despite these actions, forensic interviews with the Brooks’ children revealed no disclosures of abuse and electronic evidence analyzed by Maricopa County officials produced no support to Brook’s were abusing their children.
In February 2024, inconsistencies in Ottman’s narrative prompted detectives to re-examine the digital evidence. By April of that year, multiple warrants and IP address records had confirmed Ottman’s involvement in creating and disseminating the falsified Reddit data.
Law enforcement later executed a search warrant at Ottman’s residence on Nov. 14, seizing numerous electronic devices. The Department of Public Safety analyzed the devices and later determined there was nothing evidentiary on the computers’ data. Some property was returned to Ottman’s family in January of this year.
On May 6, Ottman was charged with two felonies, obstructing a criminal investigation. and fraudulent schemes and artifices. On May 8, Ottman was indicted by a Navajo County grand jury and was issued a summons to appear in Navajo County Superior Court on June 2.
As for the search for Jarrett Brooks, there have been no progress made on that front by law enforcement and that case remains under investigation.
