A Virginia police officer whose job was to investigate online sex crimes against children committed suicide Tuesday – moments before he was to be arrested for online sex crimes against children.
Manassas police officer David Edward Abbott, Jr. was the same cop who made headlines last year when he tried to take photos of a 17-year-old boy’s erect penis for what he claimed was investigative purposes.
A year before that, he won an award for “integrity in investigative work.”
Abbott, 39, was also part of the Northern Virginia-Washington D.C. Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force, which was how he became the lead investigator in a case where 17-year-old Trey Sim sent a photo to his 15-year-old girlfriend.
In an apparent attempt to maintain the integrity of the investigation to determine if Sim truly did send the photo, he obtained a warrant which would have allowed him to photograph the teen’s erect penis to compare to the photo of the erect penis Sim had texted his girlfriend.
The warrant would have required Sim to report to a hospital and receive an injection to make his penis erect, which would have allowed Abbott to snap the photo.
The prosecutor, judge and police department were all on board with this intrusive investigative technique, but the teen’s attorney, Jessica Foster, criticized their actions, telling a Washington Post reporter, “Who does this? It’s just crazy.”
And that statement prompted Abbott to file a lawsuit against Foster, arguing that her comments were emotionally distressing and were ruining his reputation after being called a pedophile. He quietly dropped the lawsuit last year.
But it turns out, he was a pedophile after all.
The detective was about to be arrested for having inappropriate relations with two boys, ages 11 and 13, when he killed himself, according to the Washington Post.
Abbott was well-regarded as being a hockey coach in Prince William county. This is supposedly how he met the alleged victims.
Detectives in the case told Patch.com that Abbott’s inappropriate behavior with both teens started over two years ago. Abbott allegedly contacted them via texts, phone calls, email and also met them in person at some point.
From the records obtained, it seems that Abbott had inappropriate contact with the second victim since 2008.
“This is a tragic and sad day for the Abbott family, the juvenile victims and their families, the Manassas City Police Department and our community,” read a statement from the Manassas City Police Department.
