HARTFORD CITY, IN — A sex offender from Blackford County has been accused of trying to arrange improper contact with a 14-year-old girl.
Investigators said when 36-year-old Christopher Ryan Baker of Montpelier believed he was exchanging messages with a juvenile via Snapchat, he was actually communicating with a sergeant from the Blackford County Sheriff’s Department.
That communication began on April 25, and continued until Monday, June 15, when Baker encountered the deputy at a Hartford City park where he reportedly planned to meet the girl.
On Wednesday, June 17, the Montpelier man was charged in Blackford Circuit Court with child solicitation and failure to register as a sex or violent offender, both Level 5 felonies carrying maximum six-year prison terms.
According to an affidavit, when he believed he was communicating with a juvenile, Baker posed sex-related questions, expressed interest in kissing and massaging the girl, and eventually indicated he hoped to become her boyfriend and raised the possibility they would marry.
The sergeant —a member of Internet Crimes against Children Indiana Task Force — said he had “immediately revealed to (Baker) that the individual that he was chatting with was a 14-year-old female, and was a freshman in high school.”
During an interview on June 15, Baker reportedly told the deputy he had no intention of meeting the juvenile and was in Hartford City that day “just trying to clear his mind.”
The Montpelier man said he suggested dating the juvenile “as a joke.”
He said a comment about kissing the girl was intended for his wife and sent by mistake.
“I told Baker that I believed he was lying, and I wish he would just tell the truth,” the sergeant wrote.
Baker — who gave investigators permission to inspect his cell phone —has received a Feb. 23 trial date.
In 2016, Baker, then of New Castle, pleaded guilty to sexual battery in a Henry Circuit Court 2 case that originally saw him charged with rape.
Two years later, he was convicted of failing to register as a sex or violent offender, also in Henry County.
Court records indicate Baker also has convictions for crimes including auto theft, battery, domestic battery, exploitation of an endangered adult, forgery, fraud, invasion of privacy, perjury, resisting law enforcement and theft.
Douglas Walker is a news reporter for The Star Press. Contact him at 765-213-5851 or at dwalker@muncie.gannett.com.
This article originally appeared on Muncie Star Press: Blackford County sex offender charged with child solicitation
Reporting by Douglas Walker, Muncie Star Press / Muncie Star Press
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By Douglas Walker, Muncie Star Press | USA TODAY Network
