NEWS RELEASE

OFFICE OF THE UNITED STATES ATTORNEY

WESTERN DISTRICT OF MISSOURI

JOHN F. WOOD

Contact Don Ledford, Public Affairs ● (816) 426-4220 ● 400 East Ninth Street, Room 5510 ● Kansas City, MO 64106

www.usdoj.gov/usao/mow/index.html

FEBRUARY 21, 2008

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

FORMER LEE’S SUMMIT FIREFIGHTER PLEADS GUILTY TO

ENTICING A MINOR FOR SEX

KANSAS CITY, Mo. – John F. Wood, United States Attorney for the Western District of Missouri, announced that a former Lee’s Summit, Mo., firefighter pleaded guilty in federal court today to using the Internet to entice a person he believed to be a 14-year-old girl to engage in illegal sexual activity.

Christopher D. Snyder, 28, of Lee’s Summit, waived his right to a grand jury and pleaded guilty before U.S. District Judge Ortrie D. Smith this morning to a federal information that charges him with using the Internet to entice a minor to engage in illegal sexual activity. Snyder was employed as a firefighter at the time of the offense.

Snyder admitted that he initiated a conversation in an online chat room on May 2, 2005, with a person he believed to be a 14-year-old girl, but who was in reality an undercover law enforcement officer. During a series of conversations in which he discussed meeting to engage in sexual activity, Snyder made arrangements to meet at a local grocery store. At 6:10 p.m. on May 9, 2005, Snyder drove past the grocery store twice; as he left, he was stopped and arrested by Kansas City police officers.

By pleading guilty today, Snyder also agreed to forfeit to the government a laptop computer and a 1994 Acura, which he used to commit the offense.

Under federal statutes, Snyder could be subject to a mandatory minimum sentence of five years in federal prison without parole, up to 30 years in federal prison without parole, plus a fine up to $250,000. A sentencing hearing will be scheduled after the completion of a presentence investigation by the United States Probation Office.

This case was prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Cynthia L. Cordes. It was investigated by the Kansas City, Mo., Police Department.

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