CALIFORNIA
New York Times
By LIAM STACK and ASHLEY SOUTHALL
FEB. 2, 2016
A young seminary student from Ohio flew across the United States on Friday in pursuit of a goal he had spent weeks discussing online in explicit detail: finding a baby, either through adoption or cash purchase, to sexually assault.
The flight was the first leg of an itinerary that was to lead to Mexico, but the seminarian, Joel A. Wright, was arrested at San Diego International Airport before he could continue the trip.
Unbeknown to him, he had been trading emails with undercover federal agents.
Mr. Wright was arrested by Homeland Security Investigations, part of Immigration and Customs Enforcement, which said he had spent almost two years searching for female children under the age of 4 in Tijuana, Mexico, for a violent sexual encounter.
“This investigation opens a window into a secret world where sexual predators prey on young children around the globe,” Dave Shaw, a special agent in charge of Homeland Security Investigations in San Diego, said in a statement.
Federal prosecutors charged Mr. Wright on Friday with felony counts of traveling with the intent to engage in illicit sexual conduct with a minor and aggravated sexual abuse of a child, according to the complaint.
The seminarian made his first court appearance on Monday in the United States District Court for the Southern District of California. He did not enter a plea and remained in custody, said Kelly Thornton, a spokeswoman for the United States attorney’s office in San Diego.
Magistrate Judge Bernard G. Skomal appointed public defenders to represent Mr. Wright and scheduled a detention hearing for Thursday. Federal prosecutors filed a motion to keep Mr. Wright in custody, deeming him a flight risk and a danger to the community.
A preliminary hearing in the case was scheduled for Feb. 11.
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