JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – A former member of the Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office Gang Unit pleaded guilty on Tuesday to enticement of a minor to engage in unlawful sexual activity.
Josue Garriga, 34, now faces a mandatory minimum penalty of 10 years, up to life, in federal prison. A sentencing date has not yet been set.
Recommended Videos
RELATED: JSO officer resigns after being accused in Clay County sex crime investigation involving 17-year-old | 17-year-old girl tried to take her own life after mother found out ex-JSO officer was contacting her: warrant | Jacksonville Sheriff says arrest of now-former JSO officer a ‘black eye on the agency’
Garriga will be required to register as a sex offender and serve a term of supervised release of at least 5 years.
According to court documents, Garriga met the victim at church when she was 17 years old.
Federal investigators said Garriga pursued a sexual relationship with the child victim until approximately March 7, 2024. This included reaching up the child’s skirt while she worked serving coffee before church service.
At some point, investigators said, Garriga used his JSO-issued cellphone and an undercover Instagram account to reach out to the child victim and got her phone number. Garriga then used his personal cellphone to communicate with the victim, directing their messages to an end-to-end encrypted app set to automatically delete the messages after 24 hours.
On at least two occasions, Garriga used his JSO work vehicle to travel to the child victim’s neighborhood in Clay County to meet with the minor and engage in sexual contact that was illegal under Florida law.
On another occasion, Garriga met with the teen at a coffee shop in Clay County and enticed her to his JSO work vehicle, where he engaged in unlawful sexual activity with the child victim and refused to let her leave until she performed sex acts on him.
RELATED: Sheriff Waters admonishes officer accused in hit-and-run crash while driving marked police cruiser | JSO corrections officer accused of misdemeanor battery after chasing, hitting inmate after witnessing sex act | JSO officer arrested, accused of accessing database, giving info to ‘criminals’
Garriga was at the center of a State Attorney’s Office investigation in 2019 after he shot and killed 22-year-old Jamee Johnson during a traffic stop. The interaction that turned violent when Johnson and Garriga got into a scuffle was caught on police bodycam. Although the SAO ruled the shooting justifiable, Johnson’s family filed a wrongful death lawsuit in federal court against the city. The city settled the case for $200,000.
The case was brought as part of Project Safe Childhood, a nationwide initiative launched in May 2006 by the Department of Justice to combat the growing epidemic of child sexual exploitation and abuse. Led by the United States Attorneys’ Offices and the Criminal Division’s Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section, Project Safe Childhood marshals federal, state, and local resources to locate, apprehend, and prosecute individuals who sexually exploit children, and to identify and rescue victims. For more information about Project Safe Childhood, please visit www.justice.gov/psc.