Former Navy Serviceman Pleads Guilty to Enticing Minors to Engage in Sexual Activity Over the Internet

Deirdre M. Daly, United States Attorney for the District of Connecticut, announced that ADAM M. SIMPSON, 29, a former member of the U.S. Navy who was stationed in New London, pleaded guilty today in Hartford federal court to one count of enticing minors to perform sexually explicit acts during online video chats.

According to court documents and statements made in court, between approximately January 2013 and November 2013, SIMPSON used internet-based video chatting services such as Skype, Omegle, and ooVoo, to entice girls between the ages of 12 and 16 to perform sexual acts and engage in sexually explicit conduct, which SIMPSON then recorded and saved on his computer.  In order to deceive the minors, SIMPSON misrepresented his age and utilized videos of young boys to impersonate being a young boy himself.

SIMPSON is scheduled to be sentenced by U.S. District Judge Vanessa L. Bryant on September 21, 2016, at which time he faces a mandatory minimum term of imprisonment of 10 years and a maximum term of imprisonment of life.

SIMPSON has been detained since his arrest on related state charges on January 7, 2014.

This matter is being investigated by the Connecticut State Police Computer Crimes Unit, the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Connecticut Child Exploitation Task Force, which includes federal, state and local law enforcement agencies.  The U.S. Naval Criminal Investigative Service also provided critical assistance in this investigation.  The case is being prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorneys Neeraj Patel and Nancy Gifford.

This prosecution is part of the U.S. Department of Justice’s Project Safe Childhood Initiative, which is aimed at protecting children from sexual abuse and exploitation.  For more information about Project Safe Childhood, please visit www.justice.gov/psc.

To report cases of child exploitation, please visit www.cybertipline.com.