LOGAN — A 41-year-old South Jordan man is headed to prison for trying to meet up with a 9 year old girl in Logan to have sex. Joseph Thomas Dunlop was sentenced to serve between five-years-to-life at the Utah State Correctional Facility.
According to court records, Dunlop was sentenced Dec. 4 in Logan’s 1st District Court. He previously pleaded guilty to aggravated sexual exploitation of a minor and solicitation to commit sodomy on a child, both first-degree felonies.
In March, Dunlop began messaging a Logan City undercover officer. The officer was posing as the father of a young girl on an internet forum related to incest.
The officer reportedly received a message from Dunlop, expressing a desire to meet for the purpose of sexually abusing the supposed 9 year old girl. He described and discussed specific details, including formulating a plan of meeting to perform certain illegal acts.
As the messages continued, Dunlop described to the undercover officer how he had molested a 1 year old girl multiple times, describing the abuse in detail. He also offered to bring the baby girl with him to Logan, so that he could sexually abuse both girls.
Police report, Dunlop also sent a video of a young girl between 5 to 7 years old being raped by an adult male.
Dunlop had planned to meet at a predetermined location but never showed. He also stopped messaging the undercover officer, court papers explained.
Due to concerns that a young girl might be in danger, police were able to secure an expedited warrant, to obtain the IP address of the chats. The messages tracked to Dunlop’s home, where police served a warrant to the residence and located a 1 year old girl.
Dunlop was taken into custody for questioning. He reportedly admitted to chatting with the officer about meeting up to sexually abuse the 9 year old girl. He also confessed to sending police child pornography, which he claimed to be viewing 50 to 60 times in the past several months.
Dunlop also told police how he had sexually abused the 1 year old girl multiple times. He said, “children are not safe around him,” the arresting officer reported.
According to court records, Dunlop still faces 11 charges including aggravated sexual abuse of a child in South Jordan. He is scheduled to appear again in a Salt Lake County court Thursday.