Tennessee Man Sentenced to 10 Years for Illicit Sex with a Minor

SPRINGFIELD, Mo. – Tammy Dickinson, United States Attorney for the Western District of Missouri, announced that a Tennessee man was sentenced in federal court today for enticing a minor victim to engage in illicit sexual activity in Lawrence County, Mo.

Dylan Wade Garcia, 29, of Huntingdon, Tenn., was sentenced by U.S. District Judge Beth Phillips to 10 years and one month in federal prison without parole. The court also sentenced Garcia to a 15-year term of supervised release following incarceration.

Garcia, who pleaded guilty on Dec. 19, 2014, admitted that he used the Internet and a cell phone between June 9 and 26, 2014, to entice a minor under the age of 17 to engage in illicit sexual activity in Lawrence County.

On June 26, 2014, the Marionville School District notified the Aurora-Marionville Police Department that the child victim was missing from summer school. An officer reviewed the middle school’s video surveillance of the parking lot and saw the victim getting into a car with Tennessee license plates. The officer recognized the vehicle as one she had seen the day before at the Aurora Inn Motel. Officers located Garcia’s vehicle at the motel and found Garcia and the victim in a motel room.

The victim reported that she met Garcia online a few weeks earlier; he told her he was 16 years old. They had discussed him coming to Missouri to have sex with her and they engaged in several sexual acts in the motel room.

This case was prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Ami Harshad Miller. It was investigated by the Aurora-Marionville, Mo., Police Department and the Southwest Missouri Cyber Crimes Task Force.