New Castle man traveled to Ohio for sex with underage teenager
A New Castle man who was among 27 people nabbed in an undercover sex sting in Ohio last year admitted Wednesday that he traveled to an Ohio town south of Cleveland to have sex with a supposed teenage boy who turned out to be an agent.
Nathan Troup, 40, pleaded guilty in U.S. District Court in Pittsburgh to interstate travel to engage in illicit sexual conduct and enticement of a minor. He faces at least a decade in federal prison, where he’s been before.
In August 2020, an Ohio child sex-crimes task force set up “Operation Moving Target,” a four-day sting operation with agents and police posing as children online to nab predators.
They caught 27 men ranging in age from 21 to 61, all of them from
Ohio except Troup.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Christian Trabold said Troup made contact on Grindr, a gay dating app, with an agent posing as a 15- year- old boy. At the time, Troup was on probation from a federal conviction in Pittsburgh for child porn possession stemming from a 2008 indictment.
Mr. Trabold said Troup quickly escalated the conversation with the agent to sex and the boy’s sexual experience. He then sent pictures of his penis.
After a few days of online messaging, Troup arranged to travel to Newburgh Heights, Ohio, to have sex with the boy while his mother supposedly was away at work. On Aug. 26, 2020, he drove from Meadville, where he was living at the time, to the supposed home of the boy. Agents arrested him when he showed up with condoms and drug paraphernalia.
He later confessed, Mr. Trabold said.
Asked by U.S. District Judge Susan Paradise Baxter if everything Mr. Trabold said was true, Troup said yes but also argued that the profile the agents had set up on Grindr indicated that everyone was 18 or over.
Mr. Trabold said, however, that the agent repeatedly told Troup that he was 15. Asked if he still wanted to plead guilty, Troup replied, “Yes, Your Honor.”
The judge set sentencing for December. Troup remains locked up in Erie County.