Crime and Courts

Former DC Officer Arrested in Florida, Charged for Sex Acts With Minor

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UPDATE (March 9, 2023, 10:17 p.m.): Charges against the accused are expected to be dropped at a hearing Monday, March 13, after parents of the boy told prosecutors their son doesn't want to go forward.

A former Washington, D.C., police lieutenant was arrested in Florida over the weekend and is charged with sexual activity with a minor, authorities say.

According to court documents, police were on patrol Saturday in the city of Coconut Creek, in Broward County, when they noticed two cars following each other. One of the cars turned down a restricted access road, while the other stopped in the middle of the roadway.

Officers approached the driver of the car in the road, and he identified himself as a police officer. That driver, 53-year-old Brett Parson, retired from D.C.'s Metropolitan Police Department last year and was a member of the department’s reserve officer corps.

Parson told the officers he was in town visiting family and that he had gotten lost, police documents say. Officers gave him directions and sent him on his way.

The officers then contacted the driver of the other car, the one that turned down the restricted road. That driver, identified in court documents as a 16-year-old, told police that he and the other driver, Parson, were looking for a secluded spot. They’d met on a dating app for gay men, and they’d already met up at another location, which wasn’t private enough, the police documents said.

The charges state that the two had engaged in sex acts at that other location.

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Parson was arrested in Palm Beach and faces two counts of unlawful sexual activity with a minor.

Parson had served as head of the Metropolitan Police Department’s LGBTQ liaison unit before retiring.

A spokesperson for D. C. police says they’ve been made aware of the charges against Parson, and that he has since been fired from the reserve corps.

It is unclear whether he has an attorney.

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