Atlanta Man Sentenced for Seeking Sex with an 8-Year-Old Girl

MARK MICHAEL STEVENS, 43, of Atlanta, Georgia, was sentenced today to 11 years in federal prison on a federal charge of attempting to entice a minor to engage in sex.

Sally Quillian Yates, United States Attorney for the Northern District of Georgia, said, “This defendant sought to have sex with an 8-year-old girl—not 18, but 8. His criminal conduct serves as a chilling but important reminder that child predators remain a threat in our community and that parents, teachers, and loved ones must remain watchful for our children, especially when they are online.”

United States District Court Judge Timothy C. Batten, Sr., sentenced BOWDEN to 11 years in federal prison, to be followed by a lifetime of supervised release.

According to United States Attorney Yates and the evidence in the public record in this case: In August 2009, STEVENS, an integrated technologies (“I.T.”) manager at Bull Realty in Atlanta at the time of the offense, met the mother of the 8-year-old in an online chat room known as “dad&daughtersex.” Of the course of several days, STEVENS, using the moniker “WickeDad.” and the mother—actually an undercover FBI task force officer—discussed how STEVENS could have sexual access to the mother’s daughter. STEVENS described in graphic detail what he hoped to do with the young girl and claimed that this would not be his first such experience.

STEVENS eventually sent photos of himself, clothed and unclothed, and provided a phone number so that he could speak with the mother and confirm that she and her daughter were “real.” During the phone calls, STEVENS again discussed the illegal sex acts he intended to perform with the girl.

On September 2, 2009, STEVENS traveled to J. Christopher’s Restaurant in Sandy Springs, where he and the mother had agreed to meet before retiring to the mother’s apartment so that he could have sex with her daughter. He was arrested as he stepped out of his car and has remained in custody ever since.

This case was investigated by agents and officers of the Atlanta Safe Child Task Force, which is led by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, Atlanta Division.

Assistant United States Attorney Robert McBurney prosecuted the case.

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