Registered sex offender arrested held in West Valley Detention
Big Bear Lake teen runaway found after traveling to Nevada with man she met on MySpace
Big Bear Lake, April 30, 5:30 p.m.: Ryan Michael Long, 22, was arrested
April 22 for crossing state lines with and having sexual relations with a 14-year-old runaway from Big Bear Lake. He is currently being held at the West Valley Detention Center in San Bernardino. The bail is set at $500,000, according to Tiffany Swantek of the Big Bear Sheriff’s Department.
The Rockford, Ill., resident was arrested on charges of child stealing at the Big Bear Lake Sheriff’s station on April 22. The charges filed against him also include oral copulation with a person under 16, sexual penetration with a foreign object and unlawful sexual intercourse with a minor more than three years younger, according to San Bernardino County Superior Court records. Each charge filed is a possible felony carrying a sentence of one to eight years.
The two met on MySpace.com, a social networking site, according to detective Craig Harris. Long’s MySpace page depicts Long smoking and drinking and has his status listed as single, his religion listed as Wiccan.
Long is in custody at West Valley Detention Center in San Bernardino. Because he crossed state lines with the juvenile, he is subject to federal charges, as well. “The FBI are going to trail our case and then file additional charges at that time,” Swantek said. His court date is set for May 4 in Big Bear, Swantek said..
She was listed as a runaway juvenile. Right now, no. It is considered kidnapping becuse he is an adult. The kidnapping is a child 14 or under with the intent to commit lewd and lascivious acts. He admitted to detectives during interrogation that he was a registered sex offender in Illinois. His records are not public information because the crime he committed was while he was a juvenile, according to Harris.
There is currently a message on Long’s MySpace page claiming to be from his sister threatening the life of the girl who he was involved with. His mood is listed as “killin hoe’s [sic].” The last update to the page was on April 29. Long was in jail at the time, according to Swantek.
The above story is an update on the story below:
On April 21, Big Bear Sheriff’s deputies responded to a runaway juvenile call in the city of Big Bear Lake, according to Tiffany Swantek sheriff’s service specialist of the Big Bear Lake Sheriff’s Station. The 14-year-old female left a note for her parents saying that she was leaving home with her boyfriend. Deputies investigated the girl’s phone records and found numerous calls to and from Ryan Michael Long, a 22-year-old male from Rockford, Ill. The two met on MySpace.com, an internet social networking site.
Police officers contacted Long and told him that the girl was reported as a runaway and that he needed to return the juvenile to her family in Big Bear Lake. During the investigation, deputies discovered that Long is a registered sex offender in Illinois, according to detective Craig Harris. Big Bear police officers coordinated with deputies from the Baker, Calif., Sheriff’s substation who detained Long and returned the juvenile to her family.
The 14-year-old and Long were interviewed by police officers. The two admitted they had corresponded by computer, text messaging and cell phone calls for several months. The two also revealed that they had engaged in various sexual activities in Long’s vehicle in both California and Nevada.
Long was initially released once the juvenile was returned to her family, Harris says. But it was then found out that he was a registered sex offender in Illinois and he was arrested in Baker. “The girl did not know he was a registered sex offender,” Harris told The Grizzly. “He had told her that he had been in jail from when he was 15 to 21, but he told her it was for selling drugs at his school. She was a little shocked to find out.”
The district attorney’s office filed numerous charges against Long, each carrying prison sentences ranging from one to eight years. Long traveled across state lines with the juvenile, which is a federal offense carrying a minimum prison sentence of 15 years. The Federal Bureau of Investigation has been notified and is pursuing federal charges.
