A Frederick County, Maryland, man was sentenced to more than 12 years in federal prison Thursday for posing as a teenage girl online and pressuring young boys to send him sexually explicit content.
Federal prosecutors said Jake Tyler Patterson, 21, of Adamstown, pleaded guilty to child pornography. He was charged for seeking out minors online under the guise of a 15 or 16-year-old girl, and luring them into producing sexually explicit content in exchange for gift cards from Amazon and popular gaming platforms.
“Patterson, like many criminals, took advantage of the anonymity of the internet to pose as a minor female and solicit young boys to send him sexually explicit images and video,” U.S. Attorney Robert K. Hur said in a news release.
“One alert parent checked their child’s smartphone, found sexually explicit photos, and called the police. That call may have prevented more children from being abused by this predator,” he added.
Patterson’s victims ranged from age 12 to 15 years beginning in 2017 through December 2018, residing in Colorado, Michigan and Texas, in addition to Maryland.
Prosecutors said Patterson offered several of his victims additional gift cards in return for producing more than one sexually explicit image or video. A review of his Amazon account revealed he had purchased 55 such gift cards for a total value of approximately $2,600.
Patterson was been sentenced to 150 months in federal prison, followed by lifetime supervised release and registration as a sex offender at his place of residence, work and study under the Sex Offender and Registration Notification Act.
