May 7, 2014

Las Vegas Man Charged with Enticing Minor to Have Sex

LAS VEGAS—A Las Vegas, Nevada man who works as a family and marriage counselor appeared in federal court today following his arrest on charges that he solicited a minor for sex, announced Daniel G. Bogden, United States Attorney for the District of Nevada.

Ian Alexander Pincombe, 45, is charged in a criminal complaint with coercion and enticement of a minor. Pincombe appeared this afternoon before U.S. Magistrate Judge Carl W. Hoffman and was detained pending a preliminary hearing on May 21, 2014. If convicted, Pincombe faces a minimum of 10 years to life in prison and a $250,000 fine.

According to the criminal complaint, on April 30, 2014, a Henderson Police Department detective initiated an undercover operation regarding using technology to lure a minor. The detective located an advertisement on craigslist.com in which an individual, later identified as Pincombe, was seeking females for sex and had included a nude photograph. The undercover detective, posing as a 13-year-old girl, began communicating with Pincombe. Over the next two days, Pincombe allegedly exchanged sexually explicit e-mails and text messages with the girl, one of which included a sexually explicit photograph of himself. On May 2, 2014, Pincombe was arrested by Henderson Police Department officers at a shopping center parking lot in Henderson where he had agreed to meet the girl for a sexual encounter.

The case is being investigated by the FBI, the Henderson Police Department, and the Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force, and it is being prosecuted by Special Assistant United States Attorney Allison Herr and Assistant United States Attorney Cristina D. Silva.

The case was brought as part of Project Safe Childhood, a nationwide initiative launched in May 2006 by the Department of Justice to combat the growing epidemic of child sexual exploitation and abuse. Led by the United States Attorneys’ Offices and the Criminal Division’s Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section, Project Safe Childhood marshals federal, state, and local resources to locate, apprehend, and prosecute individuals who sexually exploit children and to identify and rescue victims. For more information about Project Safe Childhood, please visit www.usdoj.gov/psc. For more information about Internet safety education, please visit www.usdoj.gov/psc and click on the tab “Resources.”

The public is reminded that a criminal complaint contains only charges and is not evidence of guilt. The defendant is presumed innocent and entitled to a fair trial at which the government has the burden of proving guilt beyond a reasonable doubt.