A King County man is facing 17 years in federal prison after posing as a teen boy to ultimately commit sexual acts with minor girls in Auburn and various other locations, including Kitsap, Snohomish, Lewis, Clark, Thurston, and Spokane counties and Woodburn, Oregon.
On Aug. 8, James “Jake” Harrison Newcomer, 28, pleaded guilty to travel with intent to engage in sexual acts with a minor and two counts of attempted enticement of a minor. According to the Department of Justice (DOJ), Newcomer was on state supervision following his 30-month prison sentence for two counts of rape of a child when, in January 2024, he cut off his electronic monitoring device and proceeded to meet with various minor girls, including a minor in Auburn.
According to court documents, in February 2022, the Auburn Police Department was notified that a minor victim who was born in 2008 ran away overnight. Snapchat messages were then recovered from the minor victim who ran away and a Snapchat user who was later confirmed to be Newcomer.
According to documents, Newcomer told the girl how to disable her alarm at her parents’ home, and then made plans to pick her up the day she was reported missing. Newcomer then told the girl that they could make money together if they uploaded adult content online. The minor victim stated that she had sexual communication with Newcomer through Snapchat and had visited his home.
According to the DOJ, Newcomer admitted that after cutting off his electronic monitoring device, between February and April 2024, he sexually abused 10 different teens in Washington and Oregon, whom he met via various social media platforms. The DOJ reports that when he met with the girls, Newcomer gave the girls drugs and alcohol. The victims’ ages range from 12 to 16 years old, the DOJ said.
Travel with intent to engage in sexual acts is punishable by up to 30 years in prison, and enticement of a minor is punishable by a mandatory ten years in prison and up to life in prison. According to the DOJ, prosecutors and the defense will recommend a 17-year sentence. Newcomer will be sentenced on Nov. 17.
According to the DOJ, the Kent and Auburn police departments were part of this investigation. Additionally, various other police departments and agencies, including the FBI, the Woodburn, Oregon Police Department, the Marion County District Attorney’s Office, the Snoqualmie Police Department, the Black Diamond Police Department, the Des Moines Police Department and the King County Sheriff’s Office were part of the investigation.
This case was brought as part of Project Safe Childhood, a nationwide initiative launched in May 2006, by the DOJ to combat the growing epidemic of child sexual exploitation and abuse.
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