Was St. Paul sex-sting suspect entrapped? Jury to decide

By Emily Gurnon
Pioneer Press
October 29, 2014

http://www.twincities.com/localnews/ci_26823448/was-st-paul-sex-sting-suspect-entrapped-jury

Stephen Joseph Schulz

Stephen J. Schulz, who corresponded online with an undercover cop, was convicted of soliciting for sex a 15-year-old boy who was actually a St. Paul police sergeant.

Schulz posted a Craigslist ad that police responded to, setting up a sting that led to Schulz's arrest.

"The only person who had absolute control at every step of the way was this defendant," Ramsey County prosecutor Yasmin Mullings said Wednesday in her closing argument at Schulz's trial.

The Golden Valley man was convicted of one felony count of soliciting a minor online for sexual contact.

Sentencing before Ramsey County District Judge Patrick Diamond is tentatively scheduled for Dec. 12.

Mullings reminded the jury of the testimony of St. Paul police Sgt. Jeffrey Keller, assigned to the Minnesota Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force.

Keller said that in a sting operation, once the other email correspondent backs off or stops writing, the police end the communication. That's done to avoid entrapment, he testified.

But entrapment is exactly what Keller did to Schulz, argued his attorney, Paul Engh.

"They deceived him. They lied to him," Schulz said of the police. "He would never have gone to St. Paul had they not lied to him."

Schulz admitted Tuesday when he took the stand that he posted as many as 10 to 15 ads per week in the "casual encounters" or "men seeking men" categories of Craigslist, a free online advertising forum.

In one ad, posted in April 2013, Schulz said he had taken a trip to Florida with his son's high school baseball team and "some hanky panky went on." He specified what type of sexual activity he was looking for. Schulz has no children.

Keller, posing as a 15-year-old boy, wrote back and asked if he was too young. "Yes sorry," Schulz replied. Keller dropped the communication.

But Schulz contacted the "boy" again six days later. They talked about what they would do together sexually and eventually agreed to meet at an address on St. Paul's East Side that the boy said was his apartment. Schulz brought Red Bull and vodka, as requested, and said he would be driving a blue Mercedes. When the Mercedes pulled into the parking lot, police were waiting. Schulz was arrested.

At the jail, Keller interviewed Schulz, who guessed correctly that he was arrested on suspicion of "soliciting a minor, probably."

Schulz, 56, also told the sergeant that he himself had been abused by a priest in Milwaukee.

Schulz testified Tuesday that he went to meet the boy only because he wanted to warn him against being vulnerable to the same kind of sexual abuse he had suffered. His attorney had taken that position in his opening statement Monday.

But Engh seemed to abandon that argument in his closing Wednesday.

"It was his intent that no solicitation would ever take place until they met first," the attorney said. "Because until then he didn't know who he was dealing with.... He was never going to have sex with anybody until they met," and he made sure the person was at least 18, he said.

It was the cop who proposed that Schulz bring condoms, Red Bull and vodka, Engh said. Keller also told the defendant that the mother of the "boy" had found out about the rendezvous and was angry, Engh said.

No evidence was presented that Schulz had brought condoms.

Schulz, a health care administrator, had dedicated his life to being a productive citizen and helping kids, Engh said. He has no criminal record. The fact that he'd been abused by a priest made him less likely to inflict the same pain on another child, the defense attorney said.

Entrapment, Mullings said, happens when a defendant commits a crime when "the criminal design does not originate with defendant but is conceived in the mind of a government agent and the defendant is lured into committing an act that he would not otherwise have committed."

The state has the burden, when such a defense is asserted, of proving that the defendant had a "ready willingness" to commit the criminal act.

Mullings argued that Schulz had spent a lifetime in denial. He tried to repress the sexual abuse by the priest. He struggled to accept his homosexuality. He insisted that he did not have a "jock strap" fetish, though several of his postings spoke of his interest in the athletic items and he had asked the boy to wear one.

Finally, he denied he was going to meet the boy for sex, she said.

At the same time, the man who had "dedicated his life to helping out children" through volunteer work didn't try to find out about the boy's parents "except to make sure they weren't home," Mullings said.

If he was abused by the priest, "that is horrible," Mullings said. "But in no way does that detract from or change whether the defendant is guilty of this crime."

Schulz wasn't charged with what he could have done, Mullings said. In his online solicitations, she said, he had committed the crime before he left home.

The Ramsey County jury began deliberations after lunch Wednesday and reached its verdict at 5:30 p.m.