US agents investigating a former top Northern Ireland civil servant, who is facing child sex charges in Chicago, have widened their inquiry to Florida and Britain, it was revealed this evening.
Mr John Stan Mallon (62) was arrested on March 8th after allegedly arranging to meet a 14-year-old girl to have sex with him in his hotel room.
The Belfast man has been formally charged with attempting to come to Chicago to have sex with an underage girl and using the Internet to coerce a child into having sex.
He is currently in detention at the Metropolitan Correctional Centre and if convicted could face up to 15 years in prison.
His wife and daughters have travelled to the US and have been trying to get released on bail, but the US Attorney's Office have resisted, arguing he was a risk to the community.
Mr Mallon, who had travelled to the United States to attend St Patrick's Day celebrations in Washington, was working for the Ulster Scots Agency - a body jointly run by the Government and the Stormont Executive.
He had allegedly used an Internet chatline to contact the girl, who was in reality a federal agent working on another case.
Assistant US Attorney Mr Markus Funk told reporters that in one of his early e-mails, Mr Mallon admitted having sex with a 15-year-old girl in Sarasota, Florida.
"We are trying to track her down and anyone else he may have been in contact with," he said.
"Most recent statistics show that a child pornographer has some 250 victims in a lifetime. We are obviously checking all possible leads."
Officers have seized Mr Mallon's laptop computer and were examining it.
They have also contacted Scotland Yard to establish whether Mr Mallon has been engaged in similar alleged activities in Britain.
A former executive with Northern Ireland's Industrial Development Board, he allegedly had begun corresponding on an Internet site called Dad and Daughter Sex on February 6th, when he stumbled across a 14-year-old girl "Marny".
But the girl who was bombarded with 17 e-mails in 25 minutes was an undercover agent working for the Child Exploitation Unit of Cook County Sheriff's Office.
Mr Mallon, who allegedly claimed to be a rich 42-year-old president of a biotech company, emailed a younger picture of himself to the girl. When he arrived in Chicago en route to St Patrick's Day celebrations in Washington, he allegedly phoned her to meet him outside his hotel, the Amerisuites Hotel close to O'Hare Airport.
Agents have retrieved security footage of him buying a 12 pack of condoms, sweets and video tapes at a Wallgreen's Store.
When they raided his room they found a video camera ready to roll, the condoms in a drawer, the sweets and a gold necklace with a cross wrapped in pink paper on his bed.
The episode has shocked former colleagues at the Ulster Scots Agency, which was formed after the Belfast Agreement to promote a minority language.
The organisation's chairman, Ulster Unionist peer Lord Laird, said he was totally devastated by the news.
"I feel very bad for his family and himself."
Lord Laird stressed that Mr Mallon was not representing the agency when he was arrested.
"He wasn't in Chicago on Ulster Scots business. He was a part-time consultant with us and his activity had nothing to do with us," he added.
Mr Funk said he also sympathised with Mr Mallon's family.
"I feel horrible for them. They are always the ones that get hurt the most. It is fortunate that there wasn't a victim in this case," he added.
Mr Mallon, who has already appeared twice in court, is due to appear again for a detention hearing next Monday.
PA