A Tri-Cities man met girls on Facebook and asked for nude photos. He’s off to prison

A Kennewick man who befriended underage girls on Facebook is going to prison for asking those girls to take nude pictures of themselves to send to him.

Jesus Rodriguez, 28, was sentenced to 14 years in federal prison for one count of receipt of child pornography.

After receiving the pornographic images, Rodriguez was successful on at least two separate occasions in getting girls to meet up with him.

He gave the girls, ages 14 and 15, cellphones and marijuana in exchanging for having sex.

Rodriguez, whose nickname is “Chewy,” was not convicted of rape for either girl.

But he did plead guilty more than two years ago in Benton County Superior Court to commercial sex abuse of a minor, and received a one-year, nine-month term for that case.

He had only been out of state prison six weeks when he was indicted in U.S. District Court for the child pornography charge, along with online enticement of a minor to engage in illegal sexual activity and child sex trafficking.

Those two counts eventually were dismissed as a result of his plea agreement from March.

He was sentenced by Senior Judge Wm. Fremming Nielsen, who ordered Rodriguez to do 20 years of court supervision after he is released from prison.

Picked at random

Both cases involved Rodriguez using social media to reach out to more than a dozen young women and girls in the Tri-Cities and Moses Lake areas, and happened in 2016 and 2017. The girls all had been strangers to him.

“The sentence imposed today sends a strong message to anyone who may try to exploit children for sexual gratification,” U.S. Attorney William D. Hyslop said in a news release. “It is a priority of the United States Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Washington to prosecute anyone who traffics in child pornography or meets up with minors in person for sex.”

In the prior state case, the teen girl disclosed that she had been picked at random on Facebook by Rodriguez, and the two primarily chatted through the social media site and its Messenger app.

Their conversations revolved around sex for money and for THC, a cannabis extract, and Rodriguez’s requests for nude photos of the girl, according to court documents.

Several meetings were arranged, and Rodriguez would pick her up in his truck so the two could have sex, documents said. He paid her $120 on one occasion.

A Kennewick police detective got the girl’s permission to pose as her on Facebook and Facebook Messenger, and scheduled another date with Rodriguez in early February 2017.

Rodriguez was met by officers and a police dog in the parking lot of a Kennewick store.

He had a 9mm gun in a holster on his truck’s dashboard when arrested, documents said. There was no round in the chamber, but the magazine did have 13 rounds.

Hyslop’s news release said Rodriguez also had a gun with him when he previously had been with the 14-year-old girl.

This story was originally published July 9, 2020 at 12:58 PM.