Central California man sentenced to federal prison for abducting and sexually abusing Oregon minor he met online
By Adrian Thomas
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EUGENE, Oregon (KPTV) — A man from Mariposa California was sentenced to more than 15 years in federal prison Thursday, after abducting and repeatedly sexually abusing an Oregon minor, he met online.
According to court documents, multiple law enforcement agencies began looking for an Oregon girl declared missing by her family on August 20, 2020. Investigators eventually found a social media exchange between the girl and then 23-year-old Deven Richard Dearing who was living near Sacramento.
On August 29, FBI agents contacted Dearing and interviewed him about the exchange with the girl and her location. On the same day, the missing minor walked into a Sheriff’s Office in Merced, California and told police she had run away from home. An investigation showed Dearing told the girl to say she ran away to hide his abduction. The girl was safely returned home.
An FBI investigation revealed that Dearing had met the girl in June through a chat website called Omegle and then continued talking to her on Instagram. The chat showed that Dearing knew the girl was a minor and engaged in several months of sexually explicit exchanges. Dearing convinced the girl to send him multiple sexually explicit photos and videos.
On August 20, Dearing drove more than 600 miles from his home in California to her home in Oregon. He disabled the SIM card in the girl’s phone to block it from being tracked. He initially took the girl to a hotel where he sexually abused her and later to California where the abuse continued for more than a week. On August 29, Dearing eventually agreed to drop the girl off at a police station.
In early 2021, Dearing was charged with attempted sexual exploitation of a child, transportation with intent to engage in criminal sexual activity, receipt of child pornography and possession of child pornography. In September 2022, Dearing pleaded guilty to the first two charges. He was sentenced to 187 months in federal prison, Thursday, followed by a life term of supervised release.
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