Sexual Abusers of Children Often Get Deals, No Convictions
by Manny Garcia and Jason Grotto
Originally published by The Miami Herald, January 28, 2004
When their 14-year-old daughter didn't come home from school two years ago, the girl's frightened parents started calling school friends.
And indeed, the news was bad: The Dania Beach teen had been seduced by a man over the Internet and he had flown her to Texas to have sex.
Houston police caught Alan Salazar, then 20, in bed with the teenager before anything happened. But that was the end of the family's good fortune.
Although the parking valet pleaded no contest to interfering with the custody of a minor, a Broward County judge withheld adjudication, meaning Salazar can say he has never been convicted of a crime.
A Herald computer analysis shows the Salazar outcome is typical in Florida. State investigators spend several hundred thousand dollars yearly to trip up Internet exploiters, but most get their convictions forgiven.
And those who are convicted can often expect no more punishment than someone who turns back a car's odometer or tampers with a stone-crab trap.
A Herald examination of 18,000 sex cases involving children during the past decade found that:
More than half of adults who solicit children for sex online get withholds of adjudication, meaning they have no conviction on their record even though they plead to the crime.
Nearly eight in 10 people who publish or peddle child porn on the Internet get their convictions erased.
''In Florida, it's treated as no big deal. It's just pictures,'' said Dennis Nicewander, a Broward prosecutor who specializes in Internet child pornography investigations. "The presumption is that a guy should get a withhold and probation unless we prove otherwise.''
Four in 10 people who own child-porn pictures or videotapes get withholds.
Investigators blame the Florida Criminal Punishment Code, which scores some Internet sex crimes no worse than writing a bad check at the grocery store. It was last updated to tackle computer child exploitation in 1998.
''The law was written at a time before the explosion of the Internet,'' said Don Condon, a veteran Florida Department of Law Enforcement agent who probes Internet crimes against children.
''If you want to stem this stuff, you need to stiffen the penalties,'' Condon said. "Right now, the law could use more muscle. In the end, the goal is to protect children.''
In Florida's state courts, people who possess child pornography face a third-degree felony, but under the Criminal Punishment Code, the charges don't score high enough to merit prison time. By contrast, offenders convicted of the same crime in federal court face at least 18 months in federal prison.
Among those who caught the break in Florida:
Salazar, the Houston car valet. His charge for interfering with the custody of a minor totaled 22 points—about half the number needed to face state prison time.
Salazar, investigators say, met the middle school girl on an America Online chat room, where they conversed for more than one month.
He bought her a plane ticket to Houston. Although an unaccompanied minor, she boarded the jet after the airline called Salazar, who identified himself as her guardian.
She landed at 3 p.m. Feb. 11, 2002. Soon after, her parents went home and found she was not there at the usual hour. They called her friends, who told them about the Internet chats.
Several hours later, Houston police identified Salazar and sped to his house, banged on the door and found the girl.
According to the arrest report: "The 14-year-old girl found herself alone in a bedroom with Salazar.
"Salazar pulled her pants down and underpants down to her knees and attempted to have sexual intercourse with her. Salazar halted his attempt … when the 14-year-old girl told him to stop.''
Prosecutors in Texas and Broward charged him. He got withholds in both states and four years' probation.
Salazar's Houston attorney called the case tragic.
''He was a young college student from Colombia and didn't know it was illegal to become involved with her,'' attorney Ron Morgan said. "This was not a case where he was going to rape her. This was a completely consensual relationship.''
Ralph Alfieri, of Winter Park near Orlando, also got a withhold after he used his computer to set up a date with a 15-year-old boy, who was really an undercover cop.
DELTA4272 logged on the Internet in February 2000 and, police say, he got comfortable enough to ask the detective on a date.
''What are you doing for dinner?'' he asked.
They agreed to meet at a Burger King parking lot in Port St. Lucie. Alfieri drove up in a red Mustang. Police arrested him and found he carried a digital camera, KY lubricant and condoms.
''I wasn't going to have sex with anyone,'' he told police.
During the interview, police said Alfieri admitted that he kept nude pictures of boys on his home computer back in Winter Park.
St. Lucie police say they asked the judge to convict Alfieri and jail him for soliciting a minor for sex. But Judge Robert Makenson withheld the finding of guilt and gave Alfieri four years' probation. The judge declined to comment.
''Judges need to wake up,'' said St. Lucie Sheriff Ken J. Mascara. "These guys are very good at what they do. They know how the system works.''
In Winter Park, FDLE agents seized Alfieri's home computer.
''It was very disturbing,'' said agent Denise Nevers, who discovered scores of images of children—including a 5-year-old girl—engaged in sex with other kids or adults.
''We chose the clearest examples for jurors to see if the case went to trial,'' Nevers said. They charged Alfieri with 43 counts of unlawful possession of materials depicting sexual performance by a child, a felony.
Alfieri pleaded no contest in August 2001 to all 43 counts. Again, a judge gave him a withhold and probation.
''This was not a good guy,'' Nevers said. "But the sentencing guidelines had no teeth.''
Last August, a judge sentenced Alfieri to 15 months in prison after he violated probation by again soliciting a child on the Internet.
Many defense lawyers argue that the stings are nothing more than entrapment, pulling in men doing nothing more than fantasizing. They are victimless crimes and don't warrant prison time, they say, although their clients are still punished when their pictures end up on Florida's Sexual Offender registry.
''The truth of the matter is, most 12-year-old girls in chat rooms are really 50-year-old Secret Service agents,'' said Miami attorney David O. Markus.
But investigators note that many of the men they chat with online during stings do more than chat—they arrange a meeting and show up, fully expecting to have sex with kids. Instead, they find a cop.
In Broward, agents with the LEACH task force—Law Enforcement Against Child Harm—arrested former Franciscan priest Edward Sokol in April 2001 after he drove to a McDonald's to meet a boy for sex. The 15-year-old boy was really FDLE agent Condon.
''The worst that I ever chatted with,'' Condon said. "He was downright nasty.''
Sokol—computer name ''Onurneez2''—ran a group home for mentally disabled adults at the time.
Prosecutors asked for a conviction and incarceration. At his sentencing hearing, relatives of the adults he cared for and other supporters spoke on his behalf.
A judge gave him probation and a withhold of adjudication.
Sokol's lawyer, Michael Entin, said Sokol needed a withhold to continue operating the state-run group home. The state asked Sokol to leave the home after the case concluded.
Sokol said obtaining a withhold was important so he wouldn't be labeled a convicted felon.
''What troubled me was I never got out of my van, and I was arrested as I drove to the exit of the shopping center,'' Sokol told The Herald. "A withhold allowed me to get on with my life and start new.''
Still, he owned up to the crime.
''I had some terrible conversations in a moment of weakness,'' Sokol said. "I got carried away with this fantasy on the Internet and made a terrible mistake.''
