St. Louis Man Pleads Guilty To Failure To Register As A Sex Offender

On May 18, 2016, James C. Poynor, a thirty-seven year old St. Louis, MO, man pled guilty in federal district court, in East St. Louis, to Failure to Register as a Sex Offender, the Acting United States Attorney for the Southern District of Illinois, James L. Porter, announced today. Poyner is scheduled for sentencing on September 16, 2016, at which time he faces a maximum potential sentence of 10 years’ in prison and a fine up to $250,000, 5 years’ to life supervised release after his release from prison, and a mandatory special assessment of $100.

In 2007, a jury in Butler County, Missouri, found Poynor guilty of Child Molestation in the First Degree and Sexual Misconduct Involving a Child. Consequently, Poynor was required to register as a sex offender thereafter. Poynor signed a Missouri Sex Offender Registration Form on July 2, 2014, providing a St. Louis, Missouri address as his place of residence. Shortly thereafter, he traveled to Illinois, where he resided until his arrest on July 12, 2015, without updating his Missouri Sex Offender Registration Form or registering as a sex offender in the State of Illinois.

This case was brought as part of Project Safe Childhood, a nationwide initiative to combat the growing epidemic of child sexual exploitation and abuse launched in May 2006 by the Department of Justice. For more information about Project Safe Childhood, please visit www.usdoj.gov/psc. For more information about internet safety education, please visit www.usdoj.gov/psc and click on the tab "resources."

The case was investigated by the United States Marshals Service and is assigned to Assistant United States Attorney Daniel T Kapsak.