The United States Attorney's Office for the Northern District of California announced today that William Vail was sentenced to 33 months in prison for traveling interstate with the intent to engage in an illegal sexual act with a minor, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 2423(b), and for using the facilities of interstate commerce to attempt to persuade, induce or entice a minor to engage in an illegal sexual act, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 2422(b).  The sentence was handed down by U.S. District Court Judge Phyllis J. Hamilton following a bench trial in September 2002.

Mr. Vail, 41 of Berkeley, Illinois, was indicted by a federal grand jury on September 4, 2001.  He was charged in that indictment with traveling interstate with the intent to engage in a sexual act with a minor, in violation of Title 18, United States Code, Section 2423(b).  On June 13, 2002, another federal grand jury returned a superseding indictment against Mr. Vail.  In addition to the charge alleged in the initial indictment, the superseding indictment also charged Mr. Vail with one count of using the facilities of interstate commerce to attempt to persuade, induce or entice a minor to engage in illegal sexual activity, in violation of Title 18, United States Code, Section 2422(b).  Both charges related to Mr. Vail's contact on the Internet, through the U.S. mail, and by telephone with undercover agents of the Federal Bureau of Investigation posing as a fourteen-year-old girl in California.  Mr. Vail was arrested on August 16, 2001 at the San Francisco International Airport after he disembarked from a flight from Chicago.

Judge Hamilton sentenced Vail to 33 months in federal prison, and a three year period of supervised release.  Vail will begin serving the sentence on July 18, 2003.

The conviction is the result of a ten-month undercover investigation by Special Agents of the Federal Bureau of Investigation.  Kyle Waldinger and Miranda Kane are the Assistant U.S. Attorneys who prosecuted the case with the assistance Special Agent Martha Parker and legal assistants Cherell Hallett and Elaine McCoy