An Emsworth man is facing federal charges after engaging an FBI agent he believed was a 14-year-old girl with sexual advances, photos and videos.
Thomas Kastory, 31, of Emsworth, was charged with knowingly attempting to persuade a minor to engage in sexual activity.
There were a series of text and social-media conversations between April 12 and May 29 in which Kastory sent explicit photos and video in attempts to arrange a sexual encounter, according to a federal complaint filed by FBI Special Agent Kellen McGee from the agency’s Pittsburgh office.
On April 12, federal officials said Kastory initiated contact with an undercover FBI agent who had assumed the identify of a 14-year-old girl on a popular social media/dating platform, which was not named in the criminal complaint.
Kastory followed an initial message of “hey” with an explicit video, followed by additional photos and videos of his face and of adult male genitals, according to court documents.
The undercover agent asked Kastory if he wanted a cell phone number to text, and provided the number, where additional messages, photos and video were sent.
Screenshots of text messages from Kastory’s conversations with the undercover agent show the discussion frequently becoming sexual in nature. During an April 27 conversation, Kastory made a sexual proposition.
On May 22, Kastory and the undercover discussed the possibility of meeting to engage in sexually explicit conduct, according to the complaint.
Over the course of the next week, they continued discussing details about Kastory catching a bus to meet on May 29 near Heinz Field, McGee wrote in the criminal complaint.
On May 29, federal agents saw Kastory board a Port Authority bus at Camp Horne Road, and get off the bus near the intersection of Allegheny Avenue and Reedsdale Street on the North Side. He then walked toward Heinz Field along Allegheny Avenue.
Kastory was arrested just before 1:30 p.m. by federal agents, who seized his cell phone as well as a bag containing a box of condoms, a bottle of lubricant, a change of clothes and what federal agents described as “a purple colored sex toy.”
Following his arrest, Kastory told investigators that he was the person who had been communicating with the undercover agent, according to court documents.
He is scheduled for a 9 a.m. detention hearing on Friday at U.S. District Court in Pittsburgh. An attorney for Kastory was not listed in court records.
