Monday, January 29, 2018

Noel sex offender pleads guilty to child sexual exploitation, weapons charge

(From the U. S. Attorney for the Western District of Missouri)

A Noel, Mo., sex offender pleaded guilty in federal court today to charges related to child sexual exploitation and illegally possessing firearms.

Raymond Adair, 58, of Noel, pleaded guilty before U.S. Magistrate Judge David P. Rush to one count of traveling across state lines to engage in illicit sexual conduct and one count of being an unlawful user of a controlled substance in possession of firearms.

Adair, a registered sex offender, was previously convicted in Colorado of attempted second-degree kidnapping of a minor and two counts of indecent exposure to a minor.

By pleading guilty today, Adair admitted that he traveled from Missouri to Arkansas on May 9, 2016, to engage in illicit sexual conduct. Bentonville, Ark., police officers received two separate complaints on that day of Adair exposing himself to children walking home from school. One of the children was walking home from a school bus stop, according to the plea agreement, and investigators obtained images of Adair’s vehicle from the school bus’s surveillance cameras.

On May 11, 2016, law enforcement officers executed a search warrant at Adair’s residence and he was arrested. During the search, officers found an AR-15 rifle, a Marlin rifle, a Ruger rifle, and approximately 12 and a half pounds of marijuana.

Under federal statutes, Adair is subject to a sentence of up to 70 years in federal prison without parole. Under the terms of today’s plea agreement, Adair must pay a fine of $150,000. The maximum statutory sentence is prescribed by Congress and is provided here for informational purposes, as the sentencing of the defendants will be determined by the court based on the advisory sentencing guidelines and other statutory factors. A sentencing hearing will be scheduled after the completion of a presentence investigation by the United States Probation Office.

This case is being prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Ami Harshad Miller. It was investigated by the FBI, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, the Bentonville, Ark., Police Department and the McDonald County, Mo., Sheriff’s Department.

No comments: