Infoseek executive charged with soliciting sex with a minor
By Bloomberg News
Special to CNET News.com
September 18, 1999, 9:15 p.m. PT
Infoseek executive vice president Patrick Naughton, who oversees the Walt Disney Company's Web sites, has been charged with using the Internet to solicit sex with a minor.
The Los Angeles Times reported that Naughton, 34, was arrested Thursday on the Santa Monica Pier in California, where he had been lured by electronic messages from a male FBI agent posing as a 13-year-old girl.
A Disney spokeswoman declined to comment on the matter. Naughton has overall responsibility for the Go Network, the Internet portal for Disney's online businesses, though earlier he helped create the Internet programming language Java as an employee of Sun Microsystems.
Burbank, California-based Disney said in July it will buy the remaining stake of Sunnyvale, California-based Infoseek, the fourth-largest Internet search service, that it doesn't already own.
Naughton did not enter a plea and was ordered to post a $100,000 bond at a hearing in federal court Friday. His arraignment was set for October 12.
According to the Los Angeles Times the investigation began in March when FBI special agent Bruce Applin visited an Internet chat room known as a place where men solicit underage girls. In an affidavit, Applin said he repeatedly identified himself as a 13-year-old girl in messages with Naughton's "hotseattle" identity.
In subsequent communications, according to the FBI, Naughton directed agents to a Web site that he said had a picture of his genitals, the paper reported.
On Thursday night Naughton approached a female undercover sheriff's deputy near a roller coaster on the pier and wearing a green backpack, as had been agreed upon, the affidavit states. He was taken into custody after asking the deputy to meet him on the beach, it said.
When agents seized his portable computer Thursday night, Naughton told them that "there were sexually explicit images of children on the laptop," according to the affidavit.
News.com's Scott Ard contributed to this report
Copyright 1999, Bloomberg L.P. All Rights Reserved.
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