Washington man charged with enticing Utah teen

Washington man charged with enticing Utah teen

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LOGAN — A Washington state man was charged Thursday with trying to entice a 13-year-old girl in Utah.

Larry Alvin Ketchum, 30, who lives in Washington but has a Texas ID, was charged Thursday in 1st District Court with distribution of child pornography, a third-degree felony; enticing a minor, a second-degree felony; and dealing in harmful materials to a minor, a second-degree felony.

In July, while investigating a burglary call, police in Cache County found a Kindle Fire that contained sexually graphic messages between a man and a 13-year-old girl, according to charging documents.

Police found the girl, and after looking at her Facebook page began focusing on Ketchum, the charges state. Ketchum was using the name "Furry Paw University" on Facebook, according to court documents.

"There are pictures on his Facebook page of furry anime figures that are sexually explicit in nature," the charges state.

There were also several videos on the page of Ketchum "complaining about breaking up with his girlfriend, and asking for a girl to help him get over her. The videos are strange, and depict him sometimes just staring at the screen and making faces," according to the charges.

Messages between Ketchum and the young Utah teen "went from basic hellos to sexually explicit very quickly, with Larry asking (the girl) to be his girlfriend and meet up so they could have sex," according to the charges.


Larry immediately sent a sexually explicit picture of anime figures to (the officer).

–Charging documents


At this point, the officer was granted permission by the girl's parents to contact Ketchum using the girl's Facebook account and act as the teenager.

"Larry immediately sent a sexually explicit picture of anime figures to (the officer)," the charges state.

Investigators served several warrants on Ketchum's Facebook account. They found "that Larry Ketchum was attempting to solicit nude photographs of several young pre-pubescent girls, and actually communicated with one on Facebook Messenger," according to court records.

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Pat Reavy is a longtime police and courts reporter. He joined the KSL.com team in 2021, after many years of reporting at the Deseret News and KSL NewsRadio before that.

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