Georgia Man Accused of Attempted Child Molestation Found Dead in Cell

A Georgia man who was arrested on felony charges relating to an accusation of his attempt to meet up with a 14-year-old girl for sex has been reported as found dead in his jail cell.

Right now, officers and authorities believe the death to be a suicide but the incident is still under investigation. Regarding his arrest, he was accused of committing four different felonies including obscene internet contact with a child.

As a Georgia Sex Crimes Attorney, I will outline the law behind this particular offense as it can be relatively complicated.

Obscene Internet Contact with a Child in Georgia

Obscene internet contact with a child is defined in O.C.G.A. §16-12-100.2 as:

A person commits the offense of obscene Internet contact with a child if he or she has contact with someone he or she knows to be a child or with someone he or she believes to be a child via a computer on-line service or Internet service, including but not limited to a local bulletin board service, Internet chat room, e-mail, or on-line messaging service, and the contact involves any matter containing explicit verbal descriptions or narrative accounts of sexually explicit nudity, sexual conduct, sexual excitement, or sadomasochistic abuse that is intended to arouse or satisfy the sexual desire of either the child or the person, provided that no conviction shall be had for a violation of this subsection on the unsupported testimony of a child.

If convicted of obscene internet contact with a child, then a person will be guilty of a felony and, upon conviction thereof, shall be punished by imprisonment for not less than one nor more than ten years or by a fine of not more than $10,000.00; provided, however, that, if at the time of the offense the victim was 14 or 15 years of age and the defendant was no more than three years older than the victim, then the defendant shall be guilty of a misdemeanor of a high and aggravated nature.

Practice Note

If you or a loved one has been accused of committing any one of the various sex crimes in Georgia, call our offices today. We can help you now.