5 Arrested In Georgia Child-Sex Sting

GAINESVILLE, GA — Five men, including a convicted sex offender, have been arrested in Georgia on charges that they attempted to have sex with a child.

The men, ranging in age from 23 to 58, were arrested as part of Operation Rattlesnake, an undercover operation by the Georgia Bureau of Investigation, Georgia's Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force and other law enforcement agencies.

In the planning for months, Operation Rattlesnake was a four-day effort centered in Hall County. The arrests were made beginning Thursday, Oct. 5.

According to authorities, all of the men arrested traveled from parts of metro Atlanta with the intent of having sex with a child. One of the men arrested was a registered sex offender with previous convictions for child molestation and statutory rape, the GBI said. (SIGN UP: Get Patch's Daily Newsletter and Real Time News Alerts. Or, if you have an iPhone, download the free Patch app.)

The five men arrested were:

• Melo Hairapetian, 28, Morris, Illinois, construction worker
• Baribefe Monkpe, 23, Lawrenceville, employment unknown
• Anthony Jordan, 37, Newnan, unemployed
• Drake Cook, 23, Athens, GA, retail store employee
• James Herndon, 58, Flowery Branch, pharmacist

Anthony Wayne Jordan, of Newnan, was convicted of statutory rape in 2003, according to Georgia's sex offender registry.

All of the men are charged under Georgia's Computer or Electronic Pornography and Child Exploitation Prevention Act. Additional charges may be added, authorities said.

"I am proud that we were able to host the task force at our facility to carry it out," Hall County Sheriff Gerald Couch said of the investigation. "Moreover, I hope that these arrests send a loud and clear message: the exploitation of children will not be tolerated in Hall County. We look forward to working with the ICAC task force whenever needed to stop these predators."

During the operation, investigators posing as children online had almost 300 exchanges with people on various social media and other Web platforms. They say more than 60 of those were exchanges during which the subject initiated contact and directed the conversation toward sex.

In some cases, investigators say, the subject introduced obscene content, often exposing the supposed minor to pornography or requesting that the child take nude or pornographic images for them. More than a dozen subjects were identified as communicating with multiple investigators posing as children at the same time.

More than 170 exchanges took place on websites used for dating, socializing or even websites used for classified advertisements. Investigators say it's not unusual for minors to create profiles on these sites pretending to be older, then finding themselves vulnerable to victimization, harassment, blackmail or assault.

Local agencies taking part in the operation were:

• Brookhaven Police Department
• Coweta County Sheriff’s Office
• Forsyth County Sheriff’s Office
• Gainesville Police Department
• Georgia Information Sharing and Analysis Center (GISAC)
• Hall County Solicitor’s Office
• Hall Multi-Agency Narcotics Squad
• LaGrange Police Department
• Oakwood Police Department
• Richmond County Sheriff’s Office
• Roswell Police Department

"This type of cooperation and collaboration is invaluable in the effort to keep our children safe from predators who seek to harm them," said GBI Special Agent In Charge Debbie Garner, commander of the ICAC Task Force. "This successful operation was a partnership between all the agencies involved. We will continue to aggressively work together to protect our children.”

The task force is comprised of more than 200 local, state, and federal law enforcement agencies, other related criminal justice agencies and prosecutor’s offices. It was created by the U.S. Justice Department and is managed and operated by the GBI in Georgia.

The Georgia ICAC Task Force has made over 2,000 arrests since its inception in 2002.

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