CALIFORNIA BRIEFING / HAWTHORNE
A registered sex offender has been arrested in Hawthorne on charges of attempting to extort money and sex from a 17-year-old girl in exchange for her lost dog, police said Tuesday.
Alfredo Dempkey, 27, of Lancaster, who is on parole, found the dog and called the owner, apparently using the number on the dog’s tag, Hawthorne police said.
At first he demanded cash, but when the teenage girl told him she didn’t have enough money, he asked for sexual favors, police said.
Dempkey and the girl arranged to meet in a McDonald’s parking lot. But when Dempkey arrived Friday night with the dog, he was met by the girl’s father and police, who arrested him.
The dog was returned to the girl.
Police said that before the arrest, they saw Dempkey loitering in the area of a prostitution sting, and he apparently tried to make contact with an undercover officer.
-- Raja Abdulrahim
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