A Walnutport man is accused of trying to lure a girl to Quakertown for sex and possessing child sexual abuse images, according to authorities.<\/p>\n
The U.S. Attorney\u2019s Office earlier this month filed charges alleging Ryan Holota, 30, tried to get someone to bring a young girl to a Quakertown hotel for sex in February. In an subsequent indictment filed Wednesday, those authorities also allege Holota had child sexual abuse images on his phone.<\/p>\n
Holota is charged with using an interstate commerce facility to attempt to entice a minor into a sexual act and possessing child pornography.<\/p>\n
In late January, the FBI was contacted by someone claiming that Holota had reached out to them, asking for anyone who has \u201ckids to offer,\u201d according to federal court documents. Holota was given a phone number which he believed belonged to someone who could bring a young girl to him for sex, authorities allege. The number belonged to an FBI agent working undercover.<\/p>\n
Holota texted the agent and the two coordinated to have what Holota believed was an 11-year-old girl meet him in late March at the hotel in Quakertown, federal authorities said. Agents arrested him when he got to the hotel, court documents state.<\/p>\n
A federal grand jury indicted him on charges Wednesday. The indictment alleges child sexual abuse images were found on his phone when he was arrested.<\/p>\n
Reached Thursday, Holota\u2019s attorney, John Waldron, said he is in the process of retaining a forensic psychologist to aid in his defense.<\/p>\n
Court documents state Holota was hired as a baggage handler for Allegiant at Lehigh Valley International Airport in January 2024. It\u2019s unclear if he is still employed there. A message sent to an Allegiant spokesperson seeking additional information was not immediately returned.<\/p>\n
Holota was sent to a federal detention center and is awaiting his next court hearing.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A Walnutport man is accused of trying to lure a girl to Quakertown for sex and possessing child…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":174001,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[119,121,120,202,182,139,432],"class_list":{"0":"post-174000","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-allentown","8":"tag-allentown","9":"tag-allentown-headlines","10":"tag-allentown-news","11":"tag-crime-and-public-safety","12":"tag-local-news","13":"tag-news","14":"tag-top-stories-tmc"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/174000","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=174000"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/174000\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/174001"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=174000"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=174000"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=174000"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}