Robert Lyons

Robert's Riverside mugshot

>  "mmmm i don kno--i dont fuk guys- but if ya wan you can do me"
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> -Robert opening himself up to the decoy in chat
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**Robert Emmet Lyons** is a predator that was involved in the Riverside, California edition of **To Catch a Predator**. He is known for being the second oldest person caught on the franchise (after 70-year-old Donnie Vaughn on Takedown) and for trying to pass himself off as a 28-year-old man when in reality he was 68 at the time of his exposure. He is also known for his uncut interview, which shows him suffering from a constant twitch brought on by how nervous he is.

## Biography

Almost a year before being caught in the sting, Robert Lyons had sexually assaulted a 14-year-old boy. In February 2005, he was charged with four felony counts of lewd or lascivious acts with a child 14 or 15 years of age. In a plea deal, he pleaded guilty to one felony count while the other three charges were dropped. In September 2005, Lyons was sentenced to one year in jail to be served on weekends, five years of probation, was required to register as a sex offender, had to pay over $200 in fines, was ordered not to be around children under the age of 18 unsupervised, could not take any jobs which involve children under the age of 18, and was not allowed to possess or have access to a computer while on probation.

## Chat

68-year-old Lyons, an affluent man who worked in property management at the time, contacted a Perverted Justice decoy who was posing as a 13-year-old boy. He immediately began the chat by offering money for oral sex. He continued to make the offer even after learning the boy's age. Lyons claimed to be named "Kevin" and was 28 years old, taking off an astounding 40 years from his age. Lyons described himself as a "bottom guy." Lyons gave the boy his number after talking with him for a while. The following day, Lyons offered to be the boy's boyfriend while also offering to pay him for sex if he wanted. He continued to call the boy "cool" and "very special", then acknowledged that he had always wished he were a woman, implying that he would play the role of the boy's girlfriend. He also admitted to trying on bras and panties. He also kept saying "foo" at the end of sentences in an attempt to seem younger and more hip.

About two weeks later, Lyons got in touch with the decoy again and expressed his desire to French kiss the young man. He was informed by the decoy that his father would be out of town and that they could arrange to meet at the sting house. After the decoy asked if he would use condoms, Lyons said, "I dont fuk guys- but if ya wan you can do me." Next, he inquired about the decoy's penis size and offered to teach him how to perform doggy-style sex. He also said he would induce orgasms while remaining in a sexually aroused state. Lyons suggested that the decoy could orgasm in his mouth. Before departing, Lyons enquired of the decoy if he was sexually aroused. As Lyon's is making his way to the house, Del Harvey, Frag, and Chris Hansen reviewed his chat and pictures to learn his true identity as a 68-year-old registered sex offender by matching the picture he sent the decoy to the one in the sex offender registry.

## Sting

When Lyons made his appearance at the sting house, he appeared to be hard of hearing. Harvey, posing as the teenage boy, talked to Lyons from another room. When Harvey told him she had to brush her teeth, he responded, "Your feet?" She then asked him to wait at the counter. Lyons thought that she asked him to wait outside. Not long after, Hansen made his appearance to have Lyons sit at the counter. When Hansen questioned Lyons about the age of the person he was meeting, Lyons insisted he didn't know. He then immediately began to have a nervous twitch on his upper lip. When confronted with the age discrepancy he gave to the decoy, Lyons replied, "I lied". Lyons denied having any intentions for the decoy when asked what he was intending to do. As Hansen was reading from the chatlog, Lyons claimed he was just "messing around." As his nervous lip twitch continued, Lyons said his sexually graphic chat was "rhetoric" and that it was "off-handed." He maintained that it was not his intention to have sex with the boy and that they would just "talk." Hansen refuted his lies by asserting that he was aware of his status as a registered sex offender and by displaying a screenshot of his Megan's Law page.

Lyons acknowledged having sex with a boy who was underage. He also admitted his conviction, but he falsely claimed he was sentenced to probation rather than prison. He later acknowledged that he was still on probation, however. When asked about his victim's age, Lyons lied and said he was 15. Lyons asserted once more that he was unaware that the decoy was 13 years old. Hansen again pointed to the chatlog to counter his lies. Lyons persisted in asserting that having sex was not his desire. He then assigned the decoy the blame, saying that the decoy continued calling him and assumed he was "alone and lonely," and that the only reason he showed up was because he felt "sorry." Furthermore, he said that he thought the boy would do something to himself if he didn't come. Hansen emphasized Lyons' history with minors and rejected his arguments. Lyons once more laid the blame on the decoy, alleging that the latter kept calling and claiming to be alone. Lyons persisted in blaming the decoy, claiming that he led to the sexually explicit conversation. Hansen's patience began to wane as Lyons kept denying it.

Hansen questioned him about whether he had "talked" to his actual victim, to which Lyons responded that he was a prostitute and displayed an ID indicating his age as 18. Hansen questioned him if he was attending a counselor and mentioned his requirements and obligations as a registered sex offender. Lyons retorted that he was and had seen a counselor two weeks before arriving at the home. Lyons said that it was "pretension" and all "pretend" when questioned why he took 40 years off of his actual age. When asked what should happen to him, Lyons responded that he should obtain a new counselor and that his counseling should be enforced more strictly. Hansen then revealed who he was and the cameras came out. When he is told that he walked into a Dateline investigation, he becomes more anxious, wondering if he was going to be on the show. Hansen didn't give him a straight answer, but Lyons gave him his phone number for further contact and left. Lyons was then arrested and taken into custody by the Riverside police department.

## Aftermath

Lyons was charged with three felonies: one count of attempted lewd or lascivious acts with a child under 14 years of age, one count of attempted sodomy with a child under 14 years of age, and one count of attempted oral copulation with a minor under 14 years of age and more than a ten-year difference between offender and victim. In February 2006, Lyons appeared in court shackled, wearing a orange prison jumpsuit. The District Attorney's office requested that Lyons be held without bail because they believed he was a danger to society. The judge ruled against their motion, noting that there wasn't a real victim involved, and instead ordered that Lyons be held on $100,000 bail for violating his probation and a staggering $1,000,000 bail for the Riverside charges, resulting in a total of $1.1 million bail. In the end, Lyons couldn't afford to post bail.

During Lyons' legal proceedings, an investigator from another county provided evidence indicating that Lyons had been frequently moving without updating his address on the sex offender registry. In March 2006, he appeared in court for his felony settlement conference and for a hearing to have his probation revoked. Lyons' attorney, Barry Sands, challenged the recording of the evidence, citing wiretapping concerns related to the "two-party system" law. Lyons' case went all the way to the California Supreme Court, which sided with the state. Eventually, Lyons pleaded guilty to all three felony charges and received a five-year prison sentence, getting credit for the one and a half years he'd already spent in county jail. He was released from prison in late 2010 and is now classified as a level three sex offender.

## References

1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 1.4 http://www.perverted-justice.com/?con=Pavlov1234
2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 2.3 2.4 http://dokich.blogspot.com/2006/02/exclusive-registered-sex-offender.html
3. ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 https://meganslaw.ca.gov/OffenderDisplay.aspx?searchby=offender&ID=30705271K0978&NSOPRFlag=True&x=18c90822-f4ad-4353-8df4-da0418e7b8a5
4. ↑ http://www.perverted-justice.com/?archive=Pavlov1234
5. ↑ http://www.perverted-justice.com/booking/bookingcollage.html
6. ↑ https://dokich.blogspot.com/2006/03/robert-emmet-lyons-update.html
7. ↑ https://willdefendwa.com/to-catch-a-predator-sex-stings-net-mixed-results/
8. ↑ 8.0 8.1 https://dairystatedegenerates.blogspot.com/2020/10/to-catch-predator-update-riverside-part\_26.html