Police Charge Bridgeport Man With Attempted Risk Of Injury

By Andrew Gorosko

Police said they have arrested a Bridgeport man for allegedly using a computer network in an attempt to entice a minor to engage in sexual activity with him.

Police said this week they arrested Damien Thaxter, 29, of Bridgeport on a warrant on April 27 on charges of using a computer in a criminal attempt to entice a minor to engage in sexual activity, and also criminal attempt to commit risk of injury or impair the morals of a minor.

Thaxter’s arrest is the tenth such arrest that police have made in a continuing series of separate investigations into alleged Internet predators since last August.

In the investigations that led to those arrests, police have posed as underage females on the Internet.

In similar separate cases since last August, police have arrested other men from Naugatuck, Bethel, Stratford, Cromwell, Weston, Southbury, Woodbury, Bloomfield, and Bridgeport.

After arresting Thaxter in Shelton, police processed his case. Thaxter was then released on $25,000 bail for a May 8 arraignment on the charges in Danbury Superior Court.

Police Chief Michael Kehoe explained this week that Detective Jason Frank has been conducting the ongoing investigations that have resulted in the arrests.

Det Frank explained that while investigating such cases, he accesses the Internet on computer at the police station to enter chat rooms on social networking websites where he then identifies himself as an underage female.

Eventually, a person who is seeking to have sexual contact sets up a rendezvous. In some of the investigations, police have arrested the alleged predator in Newtown.

“I’ll keep doing this as long as I have the time,” Det Frank said of the Internet-based investigations. The detective explained that he has received specialized training in conducting such investigations.

All of the ten people who have been arrested, so far, have been adult males, ranging in age from their 20s to their 50s. Chief Kehoe said the men are from a variety of social backgrounds.

The police chief stressed that Internet predation is illegal. Such Internet predation led to the death of an underage Danbury girl at the hands of her Internet predator several years ago, the police chief said.

“The Internet has brought out a new avenue of crime and [consequent] investigation, and police are adapting to it,” he said.