NORRISTOWN — A Chester County man, who told investigators he was a minister at a church in Harrisburg, was sent to jail after he admitted that he used a social media site to try to meet who he believed was an underage boy for sex in Conshohocken, however, unbeknownst to him he was communicating with an undercover detective posing as the child.
David Gregory Kohlmeier, 49, of the 200 block of Avon Road, Devon, was sentenced in Montgomery County Court to 11½ to 23 months in the county jail after he pleaded guilty to a felony charge of attempted involuntary deviate sexual intercourse with a child under 16 in connection with a September 2022 incident that ended in Conshohocken.
Judge Thomas C. Branca also ordered Kohlmeier to complete seven years of probation consecutive to parole, meaning Kohlmeier will be under court supervision for about nine years.
The judge ordered Kohlmeier to have not contact with minors as a condition of the sentence.
Additionally, Kohlmeier faces a lifetime requirement to report his address to state police in order to comply with the state’s Sexual Offender Registration and Notification Act, formally known as Megan’s Law.
Kohlmeier was one of five men arrested in September 2022 during an undercover sting operation conducted by county detectives on multiple social media platforms. During the operation, each of the five defendants separately engaged in extensive online and text communications with undercover detectives posing as a 14-year-old girl or a 14-year-old boy. The defendants engaged in sexually explicit electronic communications with a person they believed was a minor and then appeared at an agreed-upon meeting location in Conshohocken with the intent of having sexual relations with the minor.
Specifically, Kohlmeier, formerly of Cape Cod, Massachusetts, admitted to using the social media site Grindr to meet who he believed was a 14-year-old boy.
During his guilty plea hearing, when a prosecutor read a factual basis of the crime to support the charge, Kohlmeier responded, “I’m not denying that the conversation occurred. I wasn’t mentally well at the time.”
The investigation of Kohlmeier began on Sept. 14, 2022, when he contacted who he believed was an underage boy with the message, “What’s a sexy boy like you do for fun?” according to a criminal complaint filed by county Detective Michael Henricks and Conshohocken Detective William Walter.
Kohlmeier engaged in sexually explicit conversations with the undercover detective and eventually arranged to meet who he believed was the teenager at an apartment in the 300 block of Washington Street in Conshohocken, according to court papers.
When Kohlmeier showed up on the parking lot at the rear of the property on Sept. 15, law enforcement officers moved in and took him into custody. Kohlmeier subsequently was interviewed by detectives and admitted to communicating with who he believed was a 14-year-old boy and that he came to the apartment complex to meet the boy.
“Kohlmeier acknowledged that the two were meeting in order to engage in a sexual act,” Henricks and Walter alleged.
At the time of his arrest, Kohlmeier told detectives he had recently moved to Pennsylvania with his husband and two children and that he had accepted a position as a minister at a Unitarian church in Harrisburg, according to the arrest affidavit.
Officials said that since 2018, detectives working with the Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force have taken proactive efforts to safeguard children by identifying and arresting individuals who use various social media platforms to contact and then arrange to meet to have sexual relations with children.
