Missouri and Arkansas Physician Convicted of Online Sexual Enticement of a Child

            Fort Smith, Arkansas - Conner Eldridge, United States Attorney for the Western District of Arkansas, announced that Donald Wayne Lamoureaux, age 68, of Ash Flat, Arkansas, appeared today in The United States District Court in Fort Smith before The Honorable P.K. Holmes, III to enter a Change of Plea of Guilty to the charge of Coercion and Enticement of a Minor. Lamoureaux previously practiced family medicine in Horseshoe Bend, Arkansas and Dexter, Missouri and was also employed at the VA Medical facility in West Plains, Missouri.

            U.S. Attorney Eldridge commented, “The conduct exposed in this case is reprehensible and shows that the threat of abuse to young and innocent children is serious, ever-present, and very real.  Our office will continue to work with law enforcement to identify what these criminals do behind closed doors and then prosecute them and bring them to justice.”

            According to court records, officers with the Fort Smith Police Department began an undercover online investigation on January 4, 2015 directed at individuals who were using the internet to target minors for purposes of engaging in illegal sexual activity. During the operation, an undercover officer entered an internet chat room posing as an adult mother offering her four year old daughter for sexual exploitation.  The undercover officer then made contact with the Defendant, later identified as Donald Wayne Lamoureaux.  During the online conversation, Lamoureaux stated that he was a family practice doctor living in Northeast Arkansas, and provided the undercover officer with a picture of himself.  From the information and picture provided, the undercover officer was able to identify the individual as Donald W. Lamoureaux.  Lamoureaux then expressed that he would like to meet the undercover officer and her four year old daughter for sexual purposes.  Following more discussion, the undercover officer and Lamoureaux scheduled a meeting for February 6, 2015 at a hotel in West Plains, Missouri with the supposed and stated purpose for him to sexually abuse the child.  On February 2, 2015, Lamoureaux asked the undercover officer to set up a bank account so he could deposit money for expenses associated with the transportation of the four-year-old child to meet with him.  Lamoureaux made the deposit in the amount of $300.00 on February 4, 2015.  He was arrested in West Plains, Missouri on Friday, February 6, 2015, when he arrived at the meeting location.

            Sentencing will be held on a later date.  The charge of Coercion and Enticement of a minor carries a mandatory minimum sentence of not less than 10 years imprisonment without the possibility of parole and up to a life sentence, not more than $250,000 fine, or both, and a term of supervised release of not less than five years which begins after release from prison.

            This case was investigated by Homeland Security Investigations, the Fort Smith Police Department, the West Plains Police Department, and the Southwest Missouri Cyber Crimes Task Force.  Assistant United States Attorney Dustin Roberts is prosecuting the case for the United States.

            The case was brought as part of Project Safe Childhood, a nationwide initiative to combat the growing epidemic of child sexual exploitation and abuse launched in May 2006 by the Department of Justice. Led by U.S. Attorneys’ Offices and their Criminal Division Child Exploitation and Obscenity Sections (CEOS), Project Safe Childhood marshals federal, state, and local resources to better locate, apprehend, and prosecute individuals who exploit children via the Internet, as well as to identify and rescue victims. For more information about Project Safe Childhood, please visit www.projectsafechildhood.gov.

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            Related court documents may be found on Public Access to Electronic Records Website @www.Pacer.gov