Staff Report

Kelly Lee Peterson

CULVER — A Culver man was recently arrested after an online group that works to expose child predators allegedly caught him asking what he believed was a 13-year-old girl for sex.

Kelly Lee Peterson, 53, 922 S. Plymouth St., Culver, is charged with child solicitation, a level 5 felony.

On Aug. 25, officers with the Marshall County Sheriff’s Department and Culver Police Department responded to a complaint of an unknown problem involving two men arguing near a Dollar General store in Culver.

Upon arrival at the scene, officers spoke with a member of Bikers Against Predators, who said he was confronting Peterson about communicating with a decoy playing the role of a 13-year-old girl.

According to court documents, the group member was on a social media app when he was contacted by an unknown profile. They later exchanged phone numbers and began communicating via text messages. During the conversations, the decoy told him she was thirteen. Responses from the profile acknowledged the girl’s age, asking for nude pictures and sex.

Peterson sent pictures of his genitalia and was allegedly persistent when asking for nude pictures and sex from the girl, court paperwork said.

The group voluntarily turned over a cell phone for officers to preserve evidence of the crime.

Peterson also consented for officers to look at the messages on his phone which Peterson admitted to sending; however, he claimed he knew the girl was not 13 years old.

Peterson then provide a recorded statement to the Marshall County Sheriff’s Department. During the interview, Peterson again admitted that he acknowledged the child was 13 years old.

He admitted to asking the child for nude pictures and sex, and that he sent nude photos of himself to the decoy. However, he claimed the person he was talking to had previously told him that she was 22 years old in a phone conversation.

Peterson was booked in the Marshall County Jail on Aug. 25.