Church Volunteer Pleads Guilty To Luring Teens Into Sending Their Lewd Images

A former northern California church worker who was accused of tricking young boys into sending him their lewd images pleaded guilty to a federal charge of child enticement Tuesday.

William Marigny Jr., 41, is facing a mandatory minimum sentence of 10 years and a maximum life sentence for targeting boys as young as 13 years old, The Mercury News reported, citing a criminal complaint.

Marigny Jr. was volunteering with children in 2020 at the Movement Church in Oakland, Alameda County, when he allegedly used an Instagram account to pose as a 14-year-old girl and asked the victims for their nude images. The man even tried to set up a sexual encounter with a 13-year-old boy, East Bay Times reported last year.

Marigny Jr. was arrested after the victim’s mother figured something wrong was going on and alerted the authorities. His total victims are said to be 11, including those in the Central Baptist Church in Alameda, where he previously worked. The identities of victims from either church were not released.

Prosecutors said in court records that the man’s long-term experience of working with children eased his efforts to pose as one.

"(Marigny) has learned how to speak like them, how to fit in with them, how they communicate with each other – which is how he learned exactly what to say and do in order to entice his victims into producing and sending him child pornography," Assistant U.S. Attorney Samantha Schott Bennett wrote in a court filing, according to The Mercury News.

"He deceived these children into believing that he was another teenager and that he could be trusted because he was one of them," Bennett added.

Marigny Jr. was being held in Santa Rita Jail in Dublin in California’s East Bay area since his arrest and prosecutors had successfully overturned a judge’s decision to release him on a $50,000 bond.

He faces a mandatory minimum sentence of 10 years and maximum life sentence. His sentencing is scheduled for October.