http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/12165485/MIAMI - A deputy press secretary for the U.S. Department of Homeland Security was charged with using a computer to seduce a child after authorities said he struck up sexual conversations with an undercover detective posing as a 14-year-old girl.
Brian J. Doyle, 55, the fourth-ranking official in the department’s public affairs office, was expected to be placed on administrative leave Wednesday.
“He said last night that he was going to waive extradition. If he does that, we may have him back by the end of the week,” Polk County Sheriff Grady Judd said Wednesday. “He could get to court today and some lawyer may say ’no, you don’t want to do that.’ The bottom line is we don’t know when he’s coming back.”
Authorities arrested Doyle on Tuesday at his Silver Spring, Md., home as he was online with the “girl.” The undercover detective had called Doyle at work and said she got a Web camera, as he had asked her to do, and wanted to test it out, said Carrie Rodgers, Polk County Sheriff’s Office spokeswoman.
“He said he would get on the computer when he got home from work so we knew he would be on,” Rodgers said. “When (police) went to his door, he was on the computer in the middle of a conversation with the girl.”
Sexually explicit conversations, movie clips
Doyle found the teenager’s profile online and began having sexually explicit conversations with her on the Internet on March 14, the sheriff’s office said in a statement.
He sent her pornographic movie clips, as well as non-sexual photos of himself, officials said. One of the photos, released by the sheriff’s office, shows Doyle in what appears to be DHS headquarters. He is wearing a Homeland Security pin on his lapel and a lanyard that says “TSA.”
The Transportation Security Administration is part of the Homeland Security Department.
During online conversations, Doyle revealed his name, who he worked for and offered his office and government-issued cell phone numbers, the sheriff’s office said.
On several occasions, Doyle instructed her to perform a sexual act while thinking of him and described explicit activities he wanted to have with her, investigators said.
He was booked into the Montgomery County Detention Center. Doyle also faces a charge of transmission of harmful material to a minor.
There was no immediate response to messages left on Doyle’s government-issued cell phone and his e-mail, and he could not be reached by phone at the jail for comment.
Homeland Security press secretary Russ Knocke in Washington said he could not comment on the details of the investigation.
“We take these allegations very seriously, and we will cooperate fully with this ongoing investigation,” Knocke said.
― latebloomer: someone's been drinking my youth! (latebloomer), Wednesday, 5 April 2006 14:25 (twenty years ago)
OH MAN
Former Top DHS Child Porn Official A Sex Criminal?
By Justin Rood - April 5, 2006, 1:10 PM
Oh, my goodness.
As I noted earlier, a senior Homeland Security Department law enforcement agent was busted last October for exposing himself to a girl in the food court of a mall.
Next to the recent arrest of DHS spokesman Brian Doyle on child sex charges, this was just one more reason to take Operation Predator away from DHS, I said. "Predator" is the agency's program to bust child sex criminals.
Now we discover -- that law enforcement agent, Frank Figueroa, used to run Operation Predator.
The victim, a 16-year-old girl, said Figueroa pulled up a leg of his shorts, exposed himself and masturbated for about 10 minutes, according to the Tampa Tribune.
Figueroa was in court this morning; he pleaded no contest to charges of exposure of sexual organs and disorderly conduct He had formerly said he was not guilty. His trial is expected to begin tomorrow.
http://www.tpmmuckraker.com/archives/000294.php
― jhoshea (scoopsnoodle), Wednesday, 5 April 2006 16:54 (twenty years ago)
Hey-o, let's add to the pile, courtesy of motherjones.com:
April 04, 2006
Senate president's son sodomizes 18 boys, is not charged with sexual assault
Clifton Bennett, 18-year-old son of Arizona state Senate president Ken Bennett, and his friend, 19-year-old Kyle Wheeler, were charged in January of 18 counts of aggravated assault and 18 counts of kidnapping. The charges refer to incidents which occurred at a boys' student government leadership skills camp in June of 2005, at which Bennett confesed that he and Wheeler sodomized several 11- to 14-year-old boys with broomsticks and flashlights in 40 separate incidents.
Wheeler has an additional assault charge based on his choking three boys until they passed out.
Yesterday, the pair was offered a plea agreement that will include no record of sexual assault; they will likely receive 90-day jail sentences, though the judge could reduce the charges and give them no jail time at all.
According to the victims' parents, the boys are having some type of colonic difficulty, they are sleeping with their clothes on, are afraid at night, and have received sexual assault-related counseling. However, the prosecutor told the judge that the "broomsticking" was a "hazing ritual" and a punishment for breaking rules, not sexual assault. The assaults, he said, were not viewed as sexual in nature because the prosecution could not prove that the perpetrators had "sexual intent." One has to wonder how this prosecutor does with other rape cases.
Bennett is an honor student and an active member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. If convicted of a felony, he would not be allowed to go on a planned church mission in September.
― Je4nn3 Æ’urÂ¥ (Je4nne Fury), Wednesday, 5 April 2006 20:26 (twenty years ago)