Man Arrested at Tampa Library
for Online Sexual Extortion
A 51-year-old man was arrested at a Tampa, Florida, library computer terminal November 5 for an online attempt to extort a teenage girl into having cybersex with him. Federal agents found Robert Harvey Alexander, a Baptist deacon, in the Tampa-Hillsborough County Public Library’s Peninsula Library with a spiral notebook next to him opened to a page titled “Victims List” containing e-mail addresses of young females, the Tampa Tribune reported November 9.
The arrest affidavit stated that Alexander threatened a friend’s 16-year-old daughter that he would distribute fake nude photos of her and publicize her on the Internet as promiscuous unless he had phone or online sex with her. The girl’s parents informed the authorities, who determined that Alexander’s e-mails were sent from Tampa library branches.
Alexander was charged with extortion by interstate commerce, which carries a maximum sentence of two years. It was the third arrest in recent weeks by a task force comprised of local and federal law-enforcement departments targeting Internet sex crimes, WFLA-TV reported November 9.
Posted November 15, 1999.
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