GROVELAND, Fla. — A Groveland police officer who resigned following allegations of inappropriate communication with an underage girl will not face criminal charges.
Channel 9 first brought you the story in May when the officer handed in his resignation.
The criminal investigation is now complete and that officer, Conrad Perez, won’t face criminal charges.
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However, the Groveland Police Department conducted its own internal investigation and found the allegations of officer misconduct were sustained.
The 37-year-old had been on the job for less than a year when a mother first reported allegations that an officer had inappropriate conversations with her 15-year-old daughter.
That same day, the department launch an internal investigation and Perez turned in his handwritten resignation.
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The teen’s mother, who asked Channel 9 not to name her, said Perez met her daughter through his role in the police department’s explorer program, aimed at mentoring young people interested in a career in law enforcement.
When the mom checked her daughter’s devices, she said she found weeks of messages between Perez and her daughter over social media.
“He started showing her attention and she began to talk about him, his name came up a couple times in conversations at home, so that got my radar tingling,” the girl’s mother said. “The content is not appropriate between an adult and the child. It was very flirtatious. He mentioned that he would like to have her wash his bike for him in a bikini.”
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Florida Department of Law Enforcement documents show Perez has spent a short amount of time with several agencies and resigned from the Groveland PD while being investigated.
Perez, who is married, was with the Groveland PD for about 11 months.
The Lake County Sheriff’s Office also looked into the case, but did not find any criminal wrongdoing.
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The girl told investigators officer Perez also kissed her once on the lips.
The sheriff’s office said while some of the language in the chats was borderline, none of it met the Florida statutes for criminal violations.
The teen’s mom now worries Perez could someday land a job with another police agency.
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