03/14/2007

A Bradford man was arrested Tuesday by the FBI and local police
for crossing state lines to have sex with a 14-year-old girl he met
over the Internet.

Timothy Dean Peterson, 45, of 81 Williams St., is charged with
using interstate commerce, the Internet, to solicit a minor to
engage in sexual activity; and with traveling with intent to engage
in illicit sexual contact.

According to the criminal complaint, the matter was brought to
the attention of the FBI on March 2 when New York state police
investigator Gabrielle Kyser told the agency that a 14-year-old
female told a police officer assigned to her school that she had a
sexual encounter with a 45-year-old man.

Kyser had interviewed the girl, who said she met the man online
through a Yahoo! Internet instant messaging account. The man
identified himself as Peterson, told the girl his age and where he
lived. The girl initially told Peterson she was 18, but later told
him she was 15, according to the complaint.

“After she told him she was 15 years old, he said he did not
care about her age and he talked about having sex with her,” the
complaint said.

On Feb. 28, the girl agreed to meet Peterson in Portville, N.Y.,
at 6:30 a.m. near the Dollar General store. They met and had oral
sex with each other in Peterson’s car, the complaint reads. The
girl then “smoked a cigarette and drank a can of beer,” according
to the complaint.

Peterson then took the girl to her school, the complaint
reads.

After Kyser interviewed the girl, the investigator used the
girl’s e-mail account to contact Peterson. She said she could meet
him at the same time at the same location. In a response to that
e-mail, Peterson said there wasn’t much room in the car and he
would check and see what motels were available, the complaint
reads.

On March 2, Kyser went to the location of the Dollar General
wearing a hooded sweatshirt and posed as the girl. She identified
herself as a police officer when Peterson arrived. She and another
officer asked Peterson to accompany them to the state police
barracks in Olean, N.Y., to be interviewed, and Peterson
agreed.

According to the complaint, he told police that he met the girl
in an online chatroom, and at first she had said she was 18. He
said when he met the girl, he realized she was not 18, but she did
not tell him how old she was. He also admitted to the sexual
contact, the complaint stated.

New York state police arrested him on March 2 and charged him
with one count each of criminal sexual act in the second degree, a
class D felony; endangering the welfare of a child, a class A
misdemeanor; and giving alcohol to a person under 21, a class A
misdemeanor. He was remanded to Cattaraugus County Jail in Little
Valley, N.Y., at that time.

On March 5, two FBI agents interviewed Peterson at the jail. He
told them that the girl had in fact said she was 15 before they met
in person. He said he had met her on a site called
“Truesingles.com” and e-mailed for several weeks, stopped for
awhile and then started again, the complaint states.

He described the sexual encounter with the girl, said he
“immediately felt bad about what happened. I stopped a couple times
and got physically ill and I vomited because I felt so bad,” the
complaint reads.

When the girl e-mailed again and asked to meet, he agreed
because he wanted to “straighten things out” with her and had no
intention of having sex with her, the complaint reads. He also said
he is seeking counseling for his “problems,” the complaint
states.

Based on the information learned in the investigation, the FBI
agents requested a warrant for Peterson’s arrest.

On Tuesday, agents from the FBI’s Buffalo, N.Y., field office
along with the Bradford City Police arrested Peterson at his
residence.

His initial court appearance was before U.S. Magistrate Judge
Hugh B. Scott on Tuesday. He was remanded to the custody of the
U.S. Marshal’s Service pending a detention hearing scheduled for
today.

ûThe Bradford Era 2007