Washington man sentenced for soliciting sex with minor on Craigslist
SEATTLE – A northern Washington man was sentenced Friday to six and a half years in prison after attempting to cross the Canadian border for sex with an individual he believed was a 12-year-old girl.
Christopher David Johnston, 40, of Ferndale, first came to the attention of special agents with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s (ICE) Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) after posting an ad in the “casual encounters” section of Craigslist’s personal ad site. Phrases used in the ad led HSI special agents to believe Johnston was seeking sex with minors.
Johnston began communicating with an HSI special agent posing as a 12-year-old girl and over the span of two weeks sent increasingly sexualized communications asking for explicit pictures of the girl. On May 20, he began traveling toward the Canadian border with the intent of crossing illegally to meet her for sex. HSI special agents surveilled Johnston and arrested him before he crossed into Canada.
At the time of his arrest, Johnston was facing various state charges in Whatcom County that would have prevented him from crossing the border.
“Despite the various obstacles presented during his pursuit for sex with a minor, the defendant wasn’t deterred,” said Brad Bench, special agent in charge of HSI Seattle. “The well-executed undercover work by our special agents led to a substantial sentence while sparing any real effect on a potential victim.”
In asking for the prison sentence and 20-year term of supervised release, prosecutors noted in their sentencing memo that Johnston was willing to go to great lengths to reach the fictional 12-year-old despite facing pending felony charges and having no means to legally cross into Canada.
U.S. District Judge Richard A. Jones imposed 10 years’ supervised release recommending both sex offender and drug treatment saying, “Had this child been a real person…the damage would have been life-long and serious.”
Johnston is required to register as a sex offender following his release from prison.
The charges in this case are a product of Project Safe Childhood, a Department of Justice initiative launched in 2006 to combat the growing epidemic of child sexual exploitation and abuse, and HSI’s Operation Predator, an international initiative to protect children from sexual predators.
Led by the U.S. Attorneys’ Offices and the Criminal Division’s Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section, Project Safe Childhood marshals federal, state, and local resources to locate, apprehend, and prosecute those who sexually exploit children, and to identify and rescue victims.
Since the launch of Operation Predator in 2003, HSI has arrested more than 14,000 individuals for crimes against children, including the production and distribution of online child pornography, traveling overseas for sex with minors, and sex trafficking of children. In fiscal year 2015, nearly 2,400 individuals were arrested by HSI special agents under this initiative and more than 1,000 victims identified or rescued.
For additional information about wanted suspected child predators, download HSI’s Operation Predator smartphone app or visit the online suspect alerts page.
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