Lee's Summit man gets 120 days for enticing minor

PLATTE CITY, Mo. (AP) -- A former police officer who pleaded guilty to using the Internet to entice a minor for sex could spend about four months in prison, although prosecutors were seeking a six-year sentence.

Timothy W. Leighty, 37, of Lee's Summit, was sentenced Thursday for child enticement and attempted statutory sodomy. He had admitted that he used the Internet to entice someone he thought was a 14-year-old girl and traveling to Platte County to engage in sex.

The "girl" was a detective with the Platte County Sheriff's Department and Leighty was arrested when he went to a site in the county where he expected to meet the "girl."

Leighty was sentenced in Platte County Court to three years in prison, but could be released in 120 days if he successfully completes a sexual offender assessment program. He would be on probation for up to five years.

Leighty was an officer with the Warrensburg Police Department and a deputy with the Benton County Sheriff's Department, but resigned from law enforcement several years before the 2005 crime.

Those convicted of child enticement in Missouri face a minimum five-year prison sentence under a law passed in 2005.

"Given this defendant's former role as a police officer, we asked the court to sentence him to six years in prison," Platte County Prosecutor Eric Zahnd said. "That's one more year behind bars than most people guilty of child enticement in Platte County have received. Ultimately, though, the court has the power to decide what it believes is a fair sentence."

During the sentencing hearing, Leighty's attorney, John P. O'Connor, compared it with a recent statutory rape case in Jackson County, where a former sheriff's deputy was placed on probation. O'Connor implied that it would be unfair to sentence Leighty to prison when someone who actually had sex with a child received probation.