Federal prosecutors will be in court Monday seeking a five-year prison sentence for a Harbor City man charged with using the MySpace social networking site to lure underage girls into having sex with him.
Hugo Galindo Gonzalez, 25, pleaded guilty to a lesser charge of using the Internet to send information about a minor, according to a court document. The original charge carried a mandatory 10-year prison term.
Using a fake name, Gonzalez would pose as a teenager and negotiate with girls he met on MySpace to set up dates with his "older cousin," authorities said. In August 2010, when he was 24, he had sex with a 14-year-old girl he met through the site, Assistant U.S. Atty. Jennie Wang said. The majority of his 2,500 friends MySpace friends were underage girls, she added.
"He's an Internet predator," Wang said. "He would tell them, 'Age is just a number.'"Gonzalez's defense attorney, Richard Nahigian, could not be reached for comment. Wang said Gonzalez worked as a disc jockey and swim instructor. He was identified through a tip from the Palos Verdes Estates police, she said.