Man held over sexual contact with a child

Patrick Henderson, 38, of Washington, D.C., pled guilty today to arranging for a sexual contact with someone he believed to be a minor, announced U.S. Attorney Ronald C. Machen, Jr.; James W. McJunkin, Assistant Director in Charge of the FBI’s Washington Field Office; and Cathy L. Lanier, Chief of the Metropolitan Police Department (MPD).
Henderson pled guilty in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia to a charge of arranging for a sexual contact with a real or fictitious child. The Honorable Gladys Kessler is to sentence him on January 28, 2013. Henderson faces a maximum sentence of five years of imprisonment, as well as a fine of $50,000.
According to the government’s evidence, on November 21, 2011, Henderson contacted an undercover officer with the FBI’s Child Exploitation Task Force who had entered a social networking site. Over the next several days, Henderson engaged in online and telephone conversations with the undercover officer, whom he believed had access to an under-aged boy from Virginia. During this period of time, Henderson arranged with the undercover officer to meet for the purpose of engaging in sexual acts with the boy.
On November 30, 2011, Henderson traveled from his apartment to a pre-arranged meeting place in Washington, D.C. When he arrived at the meeting place, he was arrested.
This case was brought as part of the Department of Justice’s Project Safe Childhood initiative and investigated by the FBI’s Child Exploitation Task Force, which includes members of the FBI’s Washington Field Office and MPD.
Project Safe Childhood is a nationwide initiative to combat the growing epidemic of child sexual exploitation and abuse launched in May 2006 by the Department of Justice. Led by U.S. Attorneys’ Offices and the Criminal Division’s Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section, Project Safe Childhood marshals federal, state, and local resources to better locate, apprehend, and prosecute individuals who exploit children, as well as identify and rescue victims. For more information about Project Safe Childhood, please visit www.projectsafechildhood.gov.
In announcing the guilty plea, U.S. Attorney Machen, Assistant Director McJunkin, and Chief Lanier praised the MPD detectives and special agents of the FBI Child Exploitation Task Force. They also commended Assistant U.S. Attorney Julieanne Himelstein, who is prosecuting the case.