The Pinal County Sheriff’s Office says 44-year-old Larry Hudson has been arrested by the FBI in Oregon for targeting teenage girls online with sexually explicit conversations.
PCSO says Hudson, a registered sex offender, was using multiple meet-up and dating apps to target teens from Arizona and several other states, including a 16-year-old developmentally disabled girl from Illinois.
Hudson allegedly exchanged inappropriate pictures and videos with victims, and would lie to them about his age.
Hudson is accused of sending inappropriate pictures of himself as well as child pornography to an undercover PCSO detective and an undercover detective in Texas.
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In 2001 Hudson was convicted of sexually abusing a 5-year-old girl, and failed to register as a sex offender in 2005.
Hudson is facing federal charges of attempted online enticement of a minor, transmitting obscene material to a minor, and two counts each of distribution of child pornography and attempting to transmit obscene material to a minor. More charges are expected in the near future.
"Best things parents can do is be aware what social media their children are active on and make sure they're going in and looking at the profiles, see who they're communicating with," said Detective Randall Snyder with PCSO.
Snyder says this is a good reminder to talk to your children about who they accept as a friend on their social media accounts.
"Kids need to know it's not a numbers game. Just because you have 2,000 friends on Facebook it does not mean you know all those people," Snyder said. "If you haven't met them it's not a good idea to communicate with them."
PCSO believes there are more victims in Arizona and other states that had contact with Hudson. Anyone with any information about more potential victims is asked to call the FBI’s Portland Division at (503) 224-4181.
