Police arrest man, 26, in child sex sting case
CRANBERRY TWP — A Somerset County man allegedly used chat rooms and instant messaging services to contact an agent posing as a 13-year-old girl.
Authorities said Harlan Gene King, 26, of Confluence eventually drove to Cranberry on Friday expecting to meet the girl for sex.
But agents for the state attorney general's office were waiting for King, who was arrested on charges of soliciting a child for sex.
The defendant, who is in the Butler County Prison on $25,000 bail, faces a preliminary hearing at 10 a.m. Friday before Senior District Judge Joseph O'Donnell in Cranberry.
Investigators said King on June 2 entered an Internet chat room and began chatting with the purported 13-year-old girl from Cranberry.
Between June 4 and 17, the defendant engaged in seven online chats, according to court document, during which he often referred to the girl's age.
Agent Robert Gift said King eventually expressed interest in having sex with the girl.
On June 11, documents said, a female agent assisted the investigation, acting as the "voice" of the girl during a monitored telephone call with the defendant.
He disclosed his name during the sexually explicit phone conversation. Agents said they traced that and other personal information King revealed during the chats, and confirmed his identity and address.
The defendant, Gift said, on June 16 first expressed an interest in meeting the girl in Cranberry.
According to documents, he and the girl had 10 additional online conversations between June 20 and July 10. During one chat, documents said, the defendant sent a sexually explicit photograph to her.
Last Wednesday, he discussed in yet another online conversation plans to pick her up Friday in Cranberry.
On Friday morning he called the girl on his cell phone to say he was coming to Cranberry. Agents just before 11:50 a.m. spotted the defendant in his car. Moments later, authorities, including Cranberry police, arrested him.
He is charged with multiple counts of unlawful contact with a minor and criminal use of a communication facility.
