If there is a time in a man’s life that makes him feel small, Thursday could have been that day for ex-Secret Service Agent Lee Robert Moore. Caught Sexting messages with pictures of his penis to teenage girls sent him to prison for 20 years.
At his sentencing on Thursday, Moore, age 38, admitted his attraction to young girls. While his wife, along with his children and parents, watched and listened, he also said that he became a pervert.
Secret Service agent arrested in 2015
Moore was arrested late 2015 at his Churchill, MD, home. His high-security clearance was stripped, and he was fired following his arrest in November.
The case against Moore was initiated when a Delaware State Police detective, who pretended to be a 14-year-old teen, began exchanging e-mails with him. While texting the undercover officer from the “break room,” he confided that he had to go relieve someone to go on a break.
More identified himself as a law enforcement agent in the lewd e-mails and texts sent to teenage girls. Although he didn’t tell them that he worked at the White House, he wrote that he was bored patrolling the grounds on a bicycle and checking identification. Law enforcement discovered that, for almost two years, the agent had been sending illicit messages to a teen in Florida. He was also sending messages to a teen in Texas and a teen in Missouri.
The cases in Delaware and Florida were consolidated.
Social media used by agent
Delaware Child Predator Task Force detectives had created a profile on Meet24, a social media application with a mobile-based platform. It is the same app, investigators discovered, that enabled Moore to maintain a profile and have online chats while he was working.
He also used Kik messenger during a two-month stretch to hold sex-laced chats with the undercover detective, who also received a sexually graphic image from Moore.
His initial arrest was for a charge of transmitting nude photos of himself to the detective. Following his arrest, investigators discovered, as well, that Moore sent sexually lewd images of himself to the teen, plus asked her to send him explicit photos.
He acted similarly toward a Texas teen, age 14, and a Missouri teen, age 17.
Agent pleaded guilty
Moore pleaded guilty to two charges in March: enticing a minor to engage in sexual activity and sending obscene material to someone under age 16.
Federal prosecutors sought life in prison for Moore. According to court documents, prosecutors wrote that it was galling that Moore, an armed guard at the “single most important residence” in the United States, used the guard booth to take penis pics and sent them to underage girls.
During Thursday’s hearing in U.S. District Court, Palm Beach, FL, Moore’s wife asked (via a letter) Judge Daniel T.K. Hurley to give her husband a minimum sentence, which would tally ten years.
She noted that he’s still a good and decent person.
Agent addressed the court during sentencing
Moore told the court that he was selfish after his children were born and his wife was raising them. He said he was lonely. Judge Hurley, however, countered that assertion, stating that someone does not do as Moore admitted because they are “lonely.” He further expressed his concerns over the messages’ “recruitment theme” and discounted the contention that it was just a discussion.
Judge Hurley ordered that Moore obtains psychological treatment as a sex offender when released from prison in 20 years. He must also register as a sex offender and will have lifetime court-supervised release.
