Jacksonville, Florida – United States Attorney Maria Chapa
Lopez announces that Wayne Dale Epps, Jr. (35, Jacksonville) has been arrested
and charged with using the internet to attempt to entice a 12-year-old child to
engage in sexual activity. Epps faces a
mandatory minimum penalty of 10 years, and up to life, in federal prison. Epps
is currently in federal custody and has been ordered detained pending
trial.
According to court documents, on February 14, 2020, an
undercover FBI agent who was posing online as the family member of a 12-year-old
child, was contacted by the user “ksaber2040,” who was later identified as
Epps. The same undercover agent had previously engaged in online conversation
with Epps in October 2019. Over the next several days, Epps and the undercover
agent engaged in online conversation in which Epps expressed his desire to meet
the 12-year-old “child” to engage in sexual activity. Epps provided the
undercover agent with details about the sexual acts that he wished to perform
on the child. On the afternoon of February 18, 2020, Epps drove to a
prearranged location in Jacksonville to meet the child for sex and was arrested
by FBI agents.
This case was investigated by the Federal Bureau of
Investigation in Jacksonville. It is being prosecuted by Assistant United States
Attorney D. Rodney Brown.
It is another case brought as part of Project Safe
Childhood, a nationwide initiative launched in May 2006 by the Department of
Justice to combat the growing epidemic of child sexual exploitation and abuse.
Led by the United States Attorneys’ Offices and the Criminal Division’s Child
Exploitation and Obscenity Section, Project Safe Childhood marshals federal,
state, and local resources to locate, apprehend, and prosecute individuals who
sexually exploit children, and to identify and rescue victims. For more information about Project Safe
Childhood, please visit www.justice.gov/psc.
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