New Jersey lawyer gets 12 years for trying to entice Georgia child for sex

By Fran Jeffries

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

A New Jersey lawyer has been sentenced to 12 years in federal prison for trying to have sex with a 7-year-old Georgia girl.

Investigators said Tobin Nilsen, 58, of Buena, N.J., met a woman online and persuaded her to let him have sexual access to her "daughter." Tobin was unaware that the woman was an undercover FBI agent and no child was involved.

He was arrested in New Jersey after buying an airlline ticket to Atlanta to be with the child, according to investigators.

“This defendant provides another stark example of how pedophiles’ use of the Internet emboldens them to step from behind their computers and act on their impulses," said U.S. Attorney Sally Quillian Yates. "It also shows how the Internet expands child predators’ universe of victims far beyond their local community."

Yates gave these details: In May 2010, Nilsen met the undercover FBI agent in an online chatroom entitled “ChildSlaveSex.” The agent was posing as the mother of a 7-year-old girl.

Nilsen told the "mother" he wanted to introduce the woman's "daughter” to sex. For several weeks, Nilsen provided instructions on how to groom the girl for the sexual encounter. This process included exposing the girl to images of child porn that Nilsen told the mother to download from the Internet.

After Nilsen spoke with the agent on the phone to confirm she was a real female and mother, he bought an airline ticket to Atlanta so he could have sex with the girl, according to Yates.

Several days before his flight, in June 2010, Nilsen was arrested in New Jersey by local authorities when he sought to meet with another minor female as part of a local law enforcement investigation in that jurisdiction.

Nilsen was extradited to Georgia and pleaded guilty in September 2011. On Tuesday, District Court Judge Julie E. Carnes sentenced Nilsen to 12 years in prison to be followed by a lifetime of supervised release. He will be required to register as a sex offender when he leaves prison, Yates said.