Chicago Man Pleads Guilty To Posing As Woman Online To Lure Children

CHICAGO (CBS) -- A Chicago man has pleaded guilty to posing as a woman on Facebook to lure children to participate in sex acts, according to federal authorities.

Bryan Osborne, 28, pleaded guilty Nov. 29 to one count of recruiting or enticing a minor to engage in a commercial sex act, according to FBI spokesman Garrett Croon.

Osborne created an account pretending to be a woman named "Lonyae Jackson" on the social networking site and communicated with more than 2,000 people, many of them minors, prosecutors said.

Pretending to be the woman, he told several children they would be paid thousands of dollars to appear in child pornography films, the Sun-Times previously reported. First, he told them, they would need to meet with a producer named "Trey" for sex to make sure they were "suitable for filming."

That producer was also Osborne, prosecutors said. He would meet the minors for sex in a building in the West Side Austin neighborhood, then make up a reason for not paying them. He told some children they would be paid more money to recruit younger children, and enticed others to engage in prostitution with some of his recruits.

He used the Facebook handle "lonyae.gotafattie" to pose as a woman, prosecutors said.

Osborne was arrested on Feb. 9 by the FBI Chicago Child Exploitation Task Force, according to Croon.

He is scheduled to be sentenced in federal court on March 1, 2018.

(Source: Sun-Times Media Wire © Chicago Sun-Times 2017. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.)