CAPE GIRARDEAU – U.S. District Audrey G. Fleissig on Tuesday found a southeastern Missouri man guilty of attempted sexual exploitation of a minor after a one-day bench trial.
Rayford Evans, 52, used his cell phone to record a 15-year-old girl while she was bathing and using the bathroom by holding it up to a window above the bathroom door, evidence and testimony at trial showed. The victim saw the phone and told a friend, the friend’s father and then her own father, who contacted police.
Evans, of Doniphan, in Ripley County, will be sentenced later this year. The charge carries a penalty of 15 to 30 years in prison.
The FBI and the Doniphan City Police Department investigated the case. Assistant U.S. Attorney Julie Hunter is prosecuting the case.
This case was brought as part of Project Safe Childhood, a nationwide initiative to combat the growing epidemic of child sexual exploitation and abuse launched in May 2006 by the Department of Justice. Led by U.S. Attorneys’ Offices and the Department of Justice Criminal Division’s Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section, Project Safe Childhood marshals federal, state and local resources to better locate, apprehend and prosecute individuals who exploit children via the Internet, as well as to identify and rescue victims. For more information about Project Safe Childhood, please visit www.justice.gov/psc.
