Ex-Deputy Pleads Guilty in Internet Sex Case
A former sheriff’s deputy pleaded guilty Monday to using the Internet to solicit sex with an undercover FBI agent masquerading as a 13-year-old girl.
Steven Eugene Brown, 41, who worked out of the sheriff’s Lancaster station, is likely to receive an 18-month sentence under terms of a plea agreement.
Brown has been in custody since Oct. 8, when he showed up at the Westside Pavilion shopping mall for a meeting with the girl.
Prosecutors said Brown initiated sexually explicit conversations with the undercover agent in an Internet chat room for about a month before the meeting.
He encouraged her to skip school that day so they could go to a motel to have sex, the government alleged.
In exchange for his guilty plea, the prosecution agreed to drop a second charge of possessing child pornography.
Brown will be sentenced April 24 by U.S. Dist. Judge Margaret Morrow.
A Sheriff’s Department spokesman said Brown resigned after his arrest. As a convicted felon, he can no longer work in law enforcement.
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