BREAKING: Oxford man arrested on OHS campus on allegations of prostitution, child pornography
An Oxford resident has been arrested Tuesday after arriving on Oxford High School grounds for allegedly meeting up with a minor for sexual purposes.
Donald Barker, 26, an Oxford resident originally from California, was immediately taken into custody by school resource officers and undercover police agents after arriving in the west parking lot on campus.
According to the Oxford Police Department, a concerned parent of the minor contacting Barker relayed the messages to a School Resource Officer at the high school, who proceeded to set up a “sting” operation in the school parking lot to nab the unwary Barker. Investigators believe that Barker was headed to the school to have sex with that minor.
Following the arrest, a search warrant was issued for Barker’s phone and residence, where a search of his computer showed a recorded video of a minor performing sexually explicit conduct.
According to three affidavits obtained by The Charger from the Lafayette County Justice Court, Barker, between the 28th and 30th of August 2016 and on the 3rd of September, “willfully, unlawfully, and feloniously promote prostitution by (1) knowingly or intentionally soliciting another person for the purpose of prostitution, (2) agreeing to receive money for soliciting or for attempting to solicit another person for the purpose of prostitution, (3) transporting a person to a place with knowledge or reasonable cause to know the purpose of such transporting is prostitution.”
The affidavits also cite that Barker did “posses a recording video of an actual child under the age of eighteen in sexually explicit conduct as defined by Section 97-5-33 Section of Mississippi Code Child Pornography” as well as “entice and persuade and advise a child to meet with Donald Barker for the purpose of engaging in sexually explicit conduct.”
According to his Facebook, Barker moved to Oxford in 2015, and began to work at Boure on the square, but he is no longer employed there.
Barker has being held at the Lafayette County Detention Center since Tuesday on a $250,000 bond.
This is an ongoing investigation, and according to the Oxford Police Department, additional charges against Barker are possible.
Davis McCool is a third-year newspaper student. As a senior, he is both the editor-in-chief of The Charger Newspaper, and The Charger Online. Outside of...