FLORIDA
Tampa Bay Times
By John Woodrow Cox and Peter Jamison, Times Staff Writers
LARGO — The instant message arrived at 9:42 that night in mid-August last year.
“Any luck with your boy?” it said.
Professional puppeteer Ronald William Brown, according to a federal criminal complaint, had been chatting online for months with the man from Kansas who had just asked him that question.
“No,” Brown replied, “I still want to eat him, though.”
He and the boy, authorities say, attended church together in Largo. The complaint indicates Brown had fantasized about kidnapping and killing the boy. The man from Kansas, Michael Arnett, told Brown he had murdered children before, according to the complaint, so Brown asked for advice.
Brown: “Would you just knock him out?”
Arnett: “It would be the best way, for a boy his age and size yes.”
Brown: “With something? Your fist? Or what?”
Arnett: “A good whack to the back of the head, preferably with something like a blackjack.”
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