Lusk, 35 of Auburn, was indicted Wednesday by a federal grand jury on charges of transporting a minor across state lines to engage in sex.
The indictment alleges that between September 3, 2009, and September 5, 2009, Lusk transported a person under 18 in interstate commerce for the purpose of having sex with that person.
Lusk was sentenced to the maximum 20 years in prison in March after he plead guilty to six counts of rape and six counts of sodomy with a 13-year-old member of his former congregation.
Even with the 20-year sentence, Lusk will be eligible for parole after serving four years. He has already been incarcerated eight months.
But the federal charges have even harsher penalties.
The maximum potential penalties are life imprisonment, a $250,000 fine, and supervised release for life; and the minimum potential penalties are 10 years’ imprisonment and supervised release for a period of 5 years.
Lusk staged his disappearance so that he could run away with the young teen in early September.
The incident began at Briggs Lake Friday, Sept. 4 when Lusk vandalized his own vehicle and turned his boat upside down in the lake before texting his wife a license plate number and the name of the lake. Lusk admitted he did that to buy time to get out of town with the youth.
Logan County Sheriff’s Department detective Robbie Matthews testified about the relationship Lusk had with the 13-year-old at his final sentencing.
He told about how the two sometimes had sex in Lusk’s marital bed and how Lusk would often climb up a ladder and have sex with the girl while she was sleeping over at his house with his daughter.
Matthews told extensively about the incident that led to Lusk’s arrest. He recounted how Lusk planned and executed his disappearance at Briggs Lake with the 13-year-old girl and had sex several times – both in Logan County and in Illinois – before Lusk changed his mind about running away with her and brought her home.
The federal case was brought as part of Project Safe Childhood, a nationwide initiative to combat the growing epidemic of child sexual exploitation and abuse launched in May 2006 by the Department of Justice. Led by United States Attorneys’ Offices and the Criminal Division's Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section (CEOS), Project Safe Childhood marshals federal, state and local resources to better locate, apprehend and prosecute individuals who exploit children via the Internet, as well as to identify and rescue victims.
The case is being prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorney David Weiser, and it was investigated by the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Logan County Sheriff’s Department.
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