Infoseek Corp continued to stonewall media inquiries yesterday about last week’s dramatic turn of events which saw the net portal’s illustrious executive vice president of products, Patrick Naughton, snared by police in a honeytrap sting after soliciting for under-age sex over the web.
Naughton, who was on the fast-track to industry-legend status after co-authoring the Java programming language, was entrusted with all the content for the Go Network and was slated to be part of the team spearheading Go.com, a portal to include such sites as Disney.com and Family.com. Walt Disney Co, which plans to complete a buy-out of Infoseek and combine it with its own internet assets to create a new stock, distanced itself from the episode, referring all inquiries to Infoseek.
The Sunnyvale, California firm’s only comment on the case stands as a weekend email to staff from chief executive, Harry Motro, expressing shock and sadness at Naughton’s arrest. Patrick is no longer an employee of Infoseek, it concluded. The firm declined to say whether Naughton had been fired or resigned as a result of the arrest.
34-year old, married Naughton, who worked out of Infoseek’s Bellevue, Washington office was arrested after allegedly arranging a secret assignation over the internet with someone he thought was a 13-year-old girl from Los Angeles, but who was in fact a male Federal Bureau of Investigations agent. The FBI moved to mount the sting operation after Naughton allegedly began posting lewd messages in early March on an internet chat room frequented by adult males soliciting under-age girls for sex. FBI Agents swooped on Naughton as he turned up for an expected date with his cyberpal in Santa Monica, California last week.
Naughton was charged with interstate travel with the intention of having sex with a minor according to a criminal complaint lodged in the US District Court of Los Angeles. He was bailed to appear at a possible preliminary hearing on October 7 ahead of formal arraignment proceedings on October 12.
Naughton was previously employed by Starwave Corp, a web site developer for the likes of US sports TV station ESPN among others, which was traded to Infoseek when Disney took a 43% stake in the firm.
