Cops: Guatemalan offered girl $$ for sex
Lynn mom set up sting for alleged predator
A Lynn mother set up a sting that resulted in the arrest of an illegal immigrant from Guatemala accused of offering her 11-year-old daughter money for sex, authorities said.
Cesar Perez-Diaz was arraigned this week in Lynn District Court on charges of enticement of a child under 16, said Steve O’Connell, a spokesman for the Essex District Attorney’s Office.
Perez-Diaz, 48, of Lynn was declared a danger and was held without bail yesterday, pending an Aug. 28 pretrial conference, O’Connell said.
The case began, authorities said, when the girl was at a Summer Street corner store about two weeks ago and noticed a man looking at her, O’Connell said.
The man followed her out of the store and began to walk with her, asking her age, he said.
The girl told him she was 11 and continued to walk home, not wanting to speak with him, O’Connell said.
On Monday, the man approached her again while she was heading to a Lynn bus stop, he said.
“He gave her his phone number and offered her money in exchange for sex,” O’Connell said.
The girl took the number and later gave it to her mother, who tracked him down on Facebook and texted him, pretending to be her daughter, he said.
On Tuesday, the man texted her an “inappropriate” picture and asked to meet her, O’Connell said.
The mother arranged for her daughter to ride to a bus stop to meet him while the mother and a friend waited nearby, he said.
When the defendant approached the girl, the mother called police, O’Connell said, and he was arrested shortly afterward.
In a statement yesterday, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement said it had lodged a detainer with the Lynn Police Department for Perez-Diaz, a Guatemalan citizen and national, after his July 31 arrest.
“ICE previously removed Perez-Diaz from the U.S. in 2014, and he subsequently illegally re-entered the country,” said John Mohan, an ICE spokesman. “Upon resolution of the pending local charges and any subsequent jail sentence, ICE will seek to take custody of Perez-Diaz and remove him to Guatemala for a second time.”