4-Year Sentence For Sex Offender Who Visited Escondido Teen Girl

ESCONDIDO, CA – A registered sex offender who posed online as a teenage boy and carried on sexually explicit conversations with a 16-year-old girl, then showed up at her Escondido home a day after his parole ended, was sentenced Wednesday to four years in state prison.

Rennard Cawkwell, 49, was convicted in March of contacting a minor with the intent to commit a sex crime and annoying or molesting a child.

Escondido police Lt. Ed Varso said the 16-year-old victim believed she was communicating online with a 17-year-old boy.

Varso said Cawkwell was released from parole and GPS monitoring in late March 2016, then the next day showed up at the girl's home. Her family and a neighbor thwarted Cawkwell's attempt to meet the victim and called police, triggering an investigation by detectives from the Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force.

Prosecutors said Cawkwell was convicted in 2009 of preying on an 11- year-old girl online, engaging in sexual conversations then trying to meet her for sex.

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