an ex ABC News producer who was arrested and charged with transporting child sexual abuse materials, he knew that the girl he was interacting with was a minor, new documents were revealed.
James Gordon Meek, who was arrested last year in Arlington, Virginiais accused of sharing graphic child abuse fantasies and exchanging child sexual abuse images and videos with users on the messaging app Kik.
Now, newly opened letters between the fbi and Mr. Meek’s defense lawyers have revealed that a 16-year-old girl told investigators that he had sent her sexual messages even though she had told him she was underage, according to a report by The Daily Beast.
Nude and partially nude photos of the teen, which included her Snapchat username in the corner of the screenshots, were recovered from a phone during a raid on Meek’s home last year in Arlington, Virginia.
The raid was carried out by the FBI after the agency received a reports that child abuse materials were allegedly found in a Dropbox linked to a username associated with Mr. Meek.
The agency at the time found devices containing hundreds of images of children engaging in sexual acts.
The new documents do not reveal how Mr. Meek and the teen first came into contact or what their level of contact was, according to The Daily Beast, but investigators did discover Snapchat messages saved between the two.
Those messages did not include photos and were not the entirety of their conversations.
In the unsealed letter, the Justice Department wrote to Mr. Meek’s defense attorneys that the girl, referred to only as “IDENTIFIED MINOR 2,” told investigators in a recorded interview that she shared her age. with Mr. Meek when he was still 16 years old.
According to the FBI, the girl told investigators that she felt “pressured” by an account believed to belong to Mr. Meek and other men to send sexually explicit photos.
If convicted on charges of transporting child sexual abuse images, the 53-year-old former ABC News investigative producer could be sent to prison for up to 20 years.