NORFOLK, Va. (WAVY) — A U.S. Navy servicemember was sentenced Friday to 10 years in prison after attempting to meet an undercover agent posing as a 14-year-old girl for sex.
According to a release from U.S. Attorney Erik Sibert, 42-year-old Michael Andrew Cook messaged a girl on the social media app, Whisper, who identified herself as a 14-year-old.
In actuality, the girl was a special agent from the Naval Criminal Investigative Service (NCIS) working in an undercover capacity.
Between April 28, 2024, to July 12, 2024, Cook communicated with the person he thought was a 14-year-old girl, through text messages, telephone calls and social media messages while he was assigned to a Naval Command at Naval Station Norfolk.
The “girl” told Cook her father was also a U.S. Navy servicemember and that she stayed with him in Hampton during his deployment instead of her mother’s home in Carrollton. Cook suggested he could be “a kind of father figure” to her.
From June 27, 2024, through July 12, 2024, Cook initiated sexually explicit conversations with the girl, even requesting multiple pictures of her. On July 10, 2024, Cook asked the girl when she would be in the Hampton area so he could meet her. He offered to pick her up down the road from where she was staying.
Cook drove from Virginia Beach to Hampton on July 12, 2024, to meet up with her. He was arrested after sending a message that he was parked outside of her house.
At the time of the arrest, Cook was in possession of sexual toys, a pair of women’s underwear in a plastic bag and human collars used in sexual fetishes.
Cook additionally contacted two other undercover agents posing as 14-year-old girls on July 9, 2024, and July 10, 2024.
The case was part of Project Safe Childhood, a nationwide initiative launched in May 2006 by the Department of Justice to combat the growing epidemic of child sexual exploitation and abuse.