Man Raped, Molested 11-Year-Old Girl: Jury
ATLANTA, GA — A Fulton County man has been convicted of raping and molesting an 11-year-old girl he met when he was 26, then pursued sexually on Instagram with graphic texts and images.
A jury has found Allen Jesse Harris, 27, guilty of aggravated child molestation, statutory rape and sending obscene materials to a child online, Fulton County District Attorney Paul Howard announced Monday. His sentencing was scheduled for later in the day.
Prosecutors say Harris met the girl in 2016 at a park in Union City, where she was with her 12-year-old cousin. He asked her age and she told him she was 11, they say. In December of that year, Harris found the girl on Instagram and began messaging her.
(For more news like this, find your local Patch here. If you have an iPhone, click here to get the free Patch iPhone app; download the free Patch Android app here.)
At one point, she asked him if he was the same man she'd met at the park and he lied and told her no.
During a month of messaging back and forth, Harris told the girl he planned to perform oral sex on her and otherwise tried to engage her in "dirty talk," prosecutors said. On Jan. 17, 2017, Harris took an Uber ride to the girl's home.
The two ended up in the 11-year-old's bedroom, where he began to kiss and bite the child's neck. Afterwards, he performed oral sex on her several times and had intercourse with her.
About a week later, the girl's mother discovered sexually graphic messages on her tablet computer. She took the girl to Chatttahoochee Hills Police Department, where she showed investigators the messages, which included pictures of Harris's penis.
In one message, sent after the encounter in the girl's bedroom, Harris texted: "You had fun? Guess it was meant for me to run into you again?"
Union City Police arrested Harris on Feb. 12, 2017.
At trial, Harris claimed the girl had lied about her age on Instagram, claiming to be 16 years old.
Photo via Shutterstock
