Accused Predator: 'I Don't Know How It Got to This'

They are typical young teenage girls who enjoy talking to their friends on the computer. That's what they want sexual predators to believe, anyway.

(ABC News Photo Illustration)

The Florida "teenagers" who boast names like Emily and Annie and profess to love horseback riding are actually undercover detectives with the Polk County Sheriff's Department who are trying to catch sexual predators.

Polk County Sheriff Grady Judd has made a name for himself as a crusader against child molesters.

"These people are all very highly trained detectives," he said of the undercover workers gathered in a room in Lakeland, Fla. "They know how to communicate as if they are 13, 14 years of age and they are talking to people who are adults."

And by adults, he doesn't mean 18-year-olds. He means much older men.

"It's like fishing," Judd said. "Some days you go out there and catch a boat load, sometimes you go out there and catch one or two. So we would be surprised if we came up without any fish 'cause we catch them every day."

"I feel exceptionally good and when I wake up on a day like this and think you know there are predators in the community that aren't even aware that tonight they are going to sleep in my county jail and they will go to prison for the next five years," he continued, "and I'm really excited about that."

Setting Up the Sting

The sheriff rents a house a couple of times a year and sets up shop with computers, detectives and hidden cameras.

Related

Tweens Seek Net; Strangers Seek Tweens

New Sex Offender Laws for Vermont

Helpful Internet Tips for Parents

It's important, he said, to catch every move the suspect makes on camera.

"They are likely to make all kinds of incriminating statements from the time they are texting us or e-mailing with us all the way until the time we take formal statements," he said.

When the suspects come to the front door they expect to be greeted by a teenage boy or girl, "depending on their fantasy."

"Ironically, can you imagine someone who would take the risk of walking up to a strange house just because a 13- or 14-year-old said mom or dad is not here?" he asked. "But they do it every time. And once we open the door they don't resist. Some are startled when they see big burly guys with the sheriff on their vest."

It's in that room in Lakeland, Fla., that a 48-year-old bus driver from North Carolina makes contact with the three detectives. Each time he thinks he's chatting online with a cute 14-year-old girl.

And he's not mistaken about her age. It's the first thing the detectives, posing as the teen, tell him.

"You are 14?" he writes.

"Yes, how old r u?" the "teen" writes back.

"I'm 48," he responds.

And it doesn't take long before the man turns the conversation to sex.

"Would you mind me putting my hands all over you?" he asks.

"No, not at all," the "teen" writes. "Then what?"

"Fingers?" he asks.

"Huh?" the teen responds. "Run my fingers all over your body," the man writes back.

Catching the Predator?

The online chats soon turn into phone conversations. The thirty-something officer, who's got the sound of a teenager down pat, asks the man if he's going to come see her.