A Long Beach man faces sentencing Friday for traveling with a 14-year-old runaway — whom he met in an internet forum — across state lines to his apartment, where he engaged in illicit sexual activity with her.
Trevon Langstaff, 34, pleaded guilty last year in downtown Los Angeles to one federal count of traveling with intent to engage in illicit sexual conduct, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office.
In late March 2024, Langstaff drove from his Long Beach home to Peoria, Arizona, to pick up the underage girl, according to his plea agreement.
Langstaff knew the girl was 14 and told her to pretend to be 18 years old, prosecutors said.
Intending to have sexual intercourse with her, Langstaff brought the girl from Arizona to his home in Long Beach, where he engaged in sex with her. Prosecutors say that on Langstaff’s phone, law enforcement found an image that appeared to portray two children engaged in sexually explicit activity.
According to an affidavit filed with the complaint, law enforcement received a report in March 2024 of a missing 14-year-old girl. The teen’s family searched for the girl in the neighborhood and reached out to her friends, only to learn that she had said she was planning to run away, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office.
The teen also told a friend that she had met a man who harbored runaways and currently had two other teenagers staying with him, and that he would give her a phone and a room in which to stay, the affidavit states.
The victim and Langstaff met on a Reddit internet forum about runaways, according to court papers. A search of phone records revealed numerous contacts between the victim and Langstaff.
When law enforcement visited Langstaff’s Long Beach apartment to locate and rescue the victim, the teen was found hidden in a closet.
Court papers state the teen said she and Langstaff engaged in sexual contact after arriving at his apartment.
Langstaff faces up to 30 years in federal prison at sentencing, prosecutors noted.