Teacher busted sexting ‘teen’ who was an undercover detective

A graduate who was about to start his teaching career has been arrested after allegedly sending “lewd” photos to an officer he believed was a young girl.

A US man set to become a teacher allegedly sent explicit photos to someone he thought was a 14-year old girl and tried to meet up with the teen for sex, deputies said.

Aaron James Hernandez, 26, was busted on Monday by the Tulsa County Sheriff’s Office in Oklahoma during a sting operation set up by an undercover investigator, department officials said.

“It was actually a detective,” deputies tweeted of the minor whom Mr Hernandez allegedly solicited on social media.

“This morning he attempted to meet the girl for sex and was arrested.”

Mr Hernandez, who was identified by deputies as a local teacher, was in the process of being hired by Tulsa Public Schools, but had not yet been “officially employed” with the district, Tulsa World reports.

“While this person completed the required steps in our hiring process – inclusive of a background check – he was never officially employed by Tulsa Public Schools and has never interacted with any of our students as an employee of Tulsa Public Schools,” district officials told the newspaper.

The district’s conditional offer of employment to Mr Hernandez has since been rescinded “given the nature of the charges”, officials said.

Today we arrested a local teacher in a sting operation. Aaron Hernandez used social media to message who he thought was a 14 year old girl. It was actually a detective. He sent Lewd photos. This morning he attempted to meet the girl for sex and was arrested. pic.twitter.com/ktSF4r5WPG

— Tulsa County Sheriff (@TCSO) August 3, 2020

Conversations between Mr Hernandez and the undercover deputy started on messaging app Whisper and then continued on Snapchat, according to an arrest report obtained by the newspaper.

Mr Hernandez, a recent college grad, was set to start working at Booker T. Washington High School in Tulsa this US autumn as an incoming first-year teacher, WTUL reports.

The exchanges on social media between the deputy and Mr Hernandez started on July 22, deputies allege.

“Obviously you can see it doesn’t take very long from July 22 to (Monday) to develop enough evidence to make an open arrest,” Tulsa County Sargeant. Mike Moore told the station.

Once Mr Hernandez realised it wasn’t a young girl whom he was allegedly trying to meet up with for sex, he started behaving like a “mess”, Sgt Moore said.

“Acting in a manner that’s consistent with someone who knows why we came in contact with him, why we stopped him, what he was doing there,” he said.

“So that’s what I mean, he knows the seriousness of the charges he’s going to face.”

Mr Hernandez, who is facing charges including lewd proposal to a minor and soliciting a minor to perform lewd acts, remained jailed in Tulsa County on Tuesday on $US25,000 ($A35,000) bond, prison records show.

This article originally appeared on the New York Post and has been reproduced with permission