Ventura County man arrested for alleged enticement of minors for child pornography

VENTURA COUNTY, Calif. -- A Ventura County man was arrested by FBI special agents for alleged luring of young girls for child pornography on Thursday.

FBI arrested William Hayes, 57, from Newbury Park with one count of attempted production of child pornography, two counts of attempted enticement of a minor to engage in criminal sexual activity and two counts of possession of child pornography.

Hayes used online aliases including "ko hong", "hokong69" and "brianwilson2461".

From April 2017 to August 2019, he used Skype messenger to pay facilitators overseas to livestream the sexual and physical abuse of young girls.

Hayes is expected to make an appearance in the U.S. District Court on Thursday afternoon.

For 3 years, Hayes used Skype to lure young underage girls to engage in illicit sexual activity that would be livestreamed on the internet for him to watch. Hayes allegedly offered to pay these young girls after the acts were livestreamed. In messages that the FBI retrieved, he also offered to pay to have acts of torture and cruelty inflicted on these minors.

Hayes also allegedly possessed images child pornography, depicting very young minors, on his personal computer and a hard drive.

If convicted of all charges, Hayes would face a statutory maximum sentence of life in federal prison and a mandatory minimum sentence of 15 years.

The FBI is the lead agency on this case.

Anyone with information on this case is encouraged to contact the FBI’s Los Angeles field office at 310-477-6565.  

The case is being prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorneys Jeffrey M. Chemerinsky and Kevin J. Butler of the Violent and Organized Crime Section.