Source: United States Department of Justice Criminal Division
Jacksonville, Florida – Senior United States District Judge Timothy J. Corrigan has sentenced Matthew Christopher Yates (31, Hastings) to 15 years in federal prison for attempting to entice and use a child to engage in sexually explicit conduct for the purpose of producing a video of her own sexual abuse. Yates was also ordered to serve a 10-year term of supervised release and to register as a sex offender. Yates pleaded guilty on August 27, 2025. At the time of his arrest on March 11, 2022, Yates was employed as an eighth-grade teacher at a school in St. Augustine.