LAFAYETTE, La. - United States Attorney Alexander C. Van Hook announced that a Lafayette man pleaded guilty Tuesday to sending obscene pictures to an undercover law enforcement agent posing as a 10-year-old boy.
Kory Issac Wilson, 39, of Lafayette, pleaded guilty before U.S. Magistrate Judge Patrick Hanna to one count of transportation of obscene material. The plea will become final when accepted by U.S. District Judge Dee D. Drell. According to the guilty plea, Wilson began communicating with an undercover law enforcement agent on Oct. 12, 2016. The agent posed as a father who wanted help sexually exploiting a 10-year-old boy. Wilson then began communicating with a second undercover agent who posed as the 10-year-old boy. Wilson sent the second agent three sexually explicit pictures of himself via text message.
Wilson faces up to five years in prison, three of supervised release and up to a $250,000 fine. The court set the sentencing date for May 18, 2018.
This case is part of Project Safe Childhood, a U.S. Department of Justice nationwide initiative to combat the growing epidemic of child sexual exploitation and abuse. Led by U.S. Attorneys’ Offices and the Criminal Division’s Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section, Project Safe Childhood combines federal, state and local resources to better locate, apprehend and prosecute individuals who exploit children via the internet, as well as to identify and rescue victims. For more information about Project Safe Childhood, please visit www.projectsafechildhood.gov.
The U.S. Department of Homeland Security and U.S. Immigration & Customs Enforcement (ICE) also encourage the public to report suspected child predators and any suspicious activity through its toll-free hotline at (866) 347-2423. Investigators are available at all hours to answer hotline calls. Tips or other information can also be submitted to ICE online by visiting their website at www.ice.gov/exec/forms/hsi-tips/tips.asp or through the Operation Predator smartphone application www.ice.gov/predator/smartphone-app. Tips may be submitted anonymously.
The U.S. Department of Homeland Security and Louisiana State Police conducted the investigation. Assistant U.S. Attorneys T. Forrest Phillips and John Luke Walker are prosecuting the case.
Source: U.S. Department of Justice, Office of the United States Attorneys
