Kansas Sex Offender Sentenced to 21 Years for Illicit Sex with Child

KANSAS CITY, Mo. – A registered sex offender from Kansas City, Kansas, was sentenced in federal court today for crossing state lines to engage in illicit sexual activity with a 14-year-old Missouri victim he met on Facebook.

Montoryon Harris, 45, was sentenced by U.S. District Judge Gary A. Fenner to 21 years and eight months in federal prison without parole. The court also sentenced Harris to 10 years of supervised release following incarceration.

On Jan. 13, 2021, Harris pleaded guilty to one count of traveling across state lines to engage in illicit sexual conduct with a minor and one count of committing the felony offense while he was required to register as a sex offender. Harris, who has been detained in federal custody without bond since his arrest, has a 1997 felony conviction for aggravated indecent solicitation of a minor involving a 6-year-old victim. Harris, who has four prior felony convictions and 12 misdemeanor convictions, was on felony probation at the time of this offense.

On Jan. 24, 2019, the Western Missouri Cyber Crimes Task Force received a Cybertip from the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children. Facebook reported that Harris was suspected of engaging in the sexual exploitation of a 14-year-old child victim. Harris began communicating with the child victim via Facebook on Dec. 14, 2018. Soon afterward, he told her that he wanted to see her in person. Harris’s text messages quickly became sexual in nature.

A law enforcement officer contacted the child victim, who confirmed that Harris drove to her house on Dec. 17, 2018. They engaged in sexual activity in his pickup truck while parked outside her house. Afterward, Harris continued to message the child victim for the purpose of arranging another sexual encounter.

According to court documents, law enforcement investigators discovered text messages on Harris’s cell phone in which he communicated with additional children. Harris engaged in conversations of a sexual nature or solicited sexual contact with two 15-year-old children.

This case was prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney David Luna. It was investigated by Homeland Security Investigations, the Western Missouri Cyber Crimes Task Force, and the Wyandotte County, Kan., Sheriff’s Department.

Project Safe Childhood

This case was brought as part of Project Safe Childhood, a nationwide initiative launched in May 2006 by the Department of Justice to combat the growing epidemic of child sexual exploitation and abuse. Led by the United States 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 individuals who sexually exploit children, and to identify and rescue victims. 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."