text: After a Chicago cop paid a 14-year-old girl for sex in 2015, the girl told federal investigators intimate, granular details about their encounters — including the exact types of condoms he used: LifeStyles condoms and Trojan Magnum condoms in gold wrappers, court records said. 
   
   It may seem like a trivial detail that William Whitley, 61, used one type of condom over another. But an FBI criminal complaint against the 20-year veteran of the Chicago Police Department points to the brands’ relevance. The Trojan Magnum and LifeStyles condoms Whitley used to commit the crime came from outside Illinois, where the crime occurred — meaning his “conduct affected interstate commerce,” the complaint said. 
   
   That interstate element (in addition to Whitley’s use of a phone and other factors) made it possible to charge him in federal court, where Whitley pleaded guilty Tuesday to one count of sex trafficking a minor, according to court records. 
   
   Had Whitley not been charged at the federal level, he may have faced a state sentence less harsh than the mandatory 10-year minimum sentence that federal sex trafficking charges carry, the Chicago Tribune reports — which could explain why prosecutors sought federal charges. Whitley’s plea deal even says that he “acknowledges that Trojan condoms and LifeStyles condoms are manufactured outside the state of Illinois.” 
   
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   Just as out-of-state guns can justify federal rather than state charges, so, too, could out-of-state condoms, experts told the newspaper. 
   
   “The gun traveling is analagous to the condom traveling,” Juliet Sorensen, a Northwestern University law professor, told the Tribune. “The person who pulled the trigger may not have traveled, but the gun did. This police officer may not have traveled, but an aspect that he used to commit the crime did.” 
   
   Whitley will be sentenced on Sept. 4, the Sun-Times reports. He faces at least 10 years in prison, and could face up to life. 
   
   Whitley said he didn’t know the girl was only 14 when he had sex with her, according to court records. The teen girl had told Whitley she was 23 during their multiple sexual encounters in 2015. Investigators suggested the braces on the 14-year-old’s teeth could have been a hint about her real age. 
   
   Whitley maintained in court that braces “don’t dictate a person’s age,” the Chicago Sun-Times reports. 
   
   Whitley invited the 14-year-old girl to have sex with him at his apartment from June to September 2015, court records said. During the encounters, Whitley left his Chicago Police Department uniform hanging from his bedroom door, she said — and he even bragged about being a cop. Whitley also had a loaded firearm stashed under his pillow in bed, court records said. 
   
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   Whitley used his smartphone to take sexually-explicit photos of the girl at his apartment, she told investigators. Authorities found the photos (which Whitley had texted to to the girl) when they searched the girl’s phone. And when investigators searched Whitley’s apartment, they discovered the same type of leopard print bedding that had been visible in the naked pictures, court records said. 
   
   The October 2015 search of Whitley’s home also revealed contacts on his phone — “Jasmine,” “Bunny,” “Brittany Aka Mocha” and “Star” — with whom Whitley was discussing prices and meeting times, suggesting he was engaged in prostitution with them, court records said. Investigators also found the kind of Trojan Magnum gold condom wrappers the girl had described. 
   
   Beyond the 14-year-old victim, Whitley was also paying a 16-year-old runaway for sex, he admitted in his plea agreement. Whitley had originally met the 16-year-old girl at a party where older men were paying young runaways for sex, the 16-year-old told authorities. 
   
   Later, Whitley spotted the girl walking though Chicago’s Englewood neighborhood with a friend, court records said. Whitley pulled up next to them and asked the girl if she wanted to get in the car for a ride with him and “his partner” — which she believed meant he was a police officer, the girl told investigators. The girl got in the car, where Whitley was in the driver’s seat and the “partner” was in the passenger’s seat. 
   
   As they were driving, Whitley paid the girl $65 to perform oral sex on him, she told investigators. After that, Whitley became “one of her primary commercial sex customers,” court records said. 
   
   When the 16-year-old had been with Whitley for some time, she began giving his phone number out to friends so they could also have sex with Whitley for money, court records said. 
   
   Chicago police took away Whitley's police powers in September 2015, the Sun-Times reports. ||||| CPD veteran admits to paying young girls for sex, faces life in prison 
   
   William Whitley acknowledged Tuesday he paid young girls for sex. 
   
   The longtime veteran of the Chicago Police Department admitted he would order them up before he’d go to work — leaving his uniform hanging on the bedroom door and his gun under his pillow while they were in bed. 
   
   But even as he prepared to admit his guilt to a federal judge Tuesday, Whitley insisted that braces on the teeth of one young girl “don’t dictate a person’s age.” He still thought she was older. 
   
   U.S. District Judge Virginia Kendall nevertheless accepted Whitley’s guilty plea to one count of sex trafficking of a minor. He now faces a minimum of 10 years in prison but could be looking at a lifetime behind bars. His sentencing is set for Sept. 4. 
   
   CPD has previously said Whitley was stripped of his powers in September 2015. He must register within days as a sex offender. Court personnel said his current residence is problematic, but Kendall gave him until Friday to find a new place to live. 
   
   A grand jury accused Whitley last year of trafficking four teenage girls for sex, as well as producing child pornography. That followed a 2015 FBI investigation that authorities said led them to Whitley. 
   
   When confronted, Whitley acknowledged he saw braces on the teeth of a 14-year-old girl he paid for sex, according to the criminal complaint that led to his arrest. But he said he did not know her age. She apparently told him she was 23. 
   
   That same girl was arrested in a September 2015, but she told authorities about her “johns,” including Whitley, according to the complaint. She said she was introduced to him in June 2015 and had sex with him about five times, collecting between $60 and $150 from him each time. 
   
   She said he also wore a gold chain with the CPD logo on it. And at times, she said, he bragged about being a cop. 
   
   The feds said Whitley was in touch with the girl by phone “hundreds of times” between July 24, 2015 and Sept. 17, 2015. Once, after he began texting the girl, she replied, “Awww ok wassup then.” And he replied, “You already know” and added, “B4 I gotta work.” 
   
   The girl also said Whitley took naked photographs of her inside his apartment. 
   
   The 14-year-old girl led authorities to a 16-year-old girl who also said she had sex with Whitley for money. She said Whitley pulled up next to her and a friend once in Englewood and asked if they wanted to take a ride with him and “his partner.” They agreed, though the girl said she suspected Whitley might be a cop based on the way he spoke. 
   
   The 16-year-old girl said Whitley was in the driver’s seat, and the partner was in the passenger seat. That’s when she said Whitley gave her $65 “in exchange for giving him oral sex.” She said she had oral sex with Whitley five times, each time collecting $60 to $65 from him. ||||| Plenty of crimes have a technical element that allows prosecutors to pursue charges at the federal level, from using a phone to conduct illegal business across state lines to firing a gun manufactured in a different state. 
   
   In the case of former Chicago police Officer William Whitley, it wasn’t guns. It was condoms. 
   
   Whitley’s use of Trojan and LifeStyles brand condoms when he paid for sex acts with a 14-year-old girl, federal prosecutors say, meant he illegally affected interstate commerce. Because the condoms are made outside Illinois, using them in the act of a potential sex crime contributed to the ability to charge Whitley in U.S. District Court instead of the state level. 
   
   Whitley pleaded guilty Tuesday in federal court to one count of sex trafficking of a minor. In the plea agreement, prosecutors specifically mention the condom use, stating “Whitley used condoms during the commercial sex acts with Minor A” and he “acknowledges that Trojan condoms and LifeStyles condoms are manufactured outside the state of Illinois.” 
   
   There were other aspects of Whitley’s actions that hit the “federal nexus,” including his use of a cellphone to take compromising pictures of two girls and using money to pay them, prosecutors said. 
   
   Whitley was a Chicago police officer during 2015 when, he now admits, he paid between $60 to $150 for sex acts with the girl referred to as Minor A. He also admitted to engaging in commercial sex acts with three other teenage girls. He is no longer employed by the department. Whitley’s lawyer did not respond to a request for comment. 
   
   The mechanisms that allowed prosecutors to pursue Whitley at the federal level are often used for gun crimes. Invoking condoms as an avenue to interstate commerce is a different twist. 
   
   “The gun traveling is analogous to the condom traveling,” said Juliet Sorensen, a Northwestern University law professor and former federal prosecutor. “The person who pulled the trigger may not have traveled, but the gun did. This police officer may not have traveled, but an aspect that he used to commit the crime did.” 
   
   Most LifeStyles condoms are manufactured in Thailand and India. Trojan corporate parent Church & Dwight is headquartered is in Ewing, N.J., and some of its varieties are made in Thailand and Japan, according to packaging. 
   
   A federal sex trafficking charge carries a mandatory minimum sentence of 10 years in prison, a distinction that may have been important to prosecutors, Sorensen said. If Whitley would have been charged with the most serious level of sex crime in state court, a Class X felony, the minimum prison time would have been six years. 
   
   The U.S. attorney’s office also may have been making a policy statement about the seriousness of human trafficking when it made its decision to charge Whitley, she said. 
   
   The preface to the “Principles of Federal Prosecution” page on the U.S. Department of Justice website offers a detailed explanation on how these decision should be made. The highlight: “A determination to prosecute represents a policy judgment that the fundamental interests of society require the application of federal criminal law to a particular set of circumstances — recognizing both that serious violations of federal law must be prosecuted, and that prosecution entails profound consequences for the accused, crime victims, and their families.” 
   
   Joseph Fitzpatrick, the spokesman for the U.S. attorney’s office in Chicago, declined to go into the specific reasoning why Whitley was charged federally. 
   
   Prosecutors said Whitley violated Title 18, Sections 1591(a)(1) of the United States Code, which addresses sex trafficking of children by force, fraud or coercion. Whitley’s sex acts with Minor A meant he “knowingly recruited, enticed, harbored, transported, provided, obtained, maintained, patronized, and solicited” a minor, prosecutors said. 
   
   Whitley, 61, who worked for more than two decades as a Chicago police officer, paid for sex with underage teen runaways at parties, in his apartment and even in his vehicle while riding around with his partner, federal prosecutors say. Whitley also took graphic photos of many of the girls on top of his leopard-print bedspread and had their numbers stored in his phone under names such as “Bunny,” “Mocha” and “Jasmine.” He was arrested in November 2016. 
   
   Minor A, who was 14 at the time of the sex acts, told investigators she initially lied to Whitley and told him she was 23. She wore metal braces on her teeth at the time. Data recovered from the girl’s phone showed Whitley called or texted her hundreds of times. 
   
   Whitley told the girl he was a police officer and kept his police uniform hanging up in his apartment on his bedroom door, according to court documents, and also kept a loaded firearm under his pillow on the bed where he engaged in commercial sex acts with the girl. 
   
   In the plea agreement, Whitley also acknowledged he paid for sex acts with three other girls during his time as a police officer between 2012 and 2015. 
   
   Although Whitley faces a mandatory minimum sentence of 10 years in prison, he could receive more. He also will have to register as a sex offender. 
   
   On Friday, Whitley, out on bond pending sentencing, was ordered jailed by U.S. District Judge Virginia Kendall after he failed to find a place to live that did not violate the terms of the sex offender registry. With Whitley unable to find a place to stay that met the guidelines, and with Friday as his deadline to register, Kendall ordered federal marshals to detain him. 
   
   Whitley’s sentencing hearing is scheduled for Sept. 4. 
   
   The Tribune’s Jason Meisner contributed. 
   
   poconnell@chicagotribune.com 
   
   Twitter @pmocwriter 
   
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target: – A former cop who paid underage girls for sex is facing a harsher sentence over his brand of condom, the Chicago Tribune reports. William Whitley, 61, pleaded guilty this week in federal court to sex trafficking of a minor and will likely serve 10 years to life. Prosecutors leveled federal charges partly because his condoms—LifeStyles and Trojan Magnums—were manufactured outside of Illinois, meaning he engaged in interstate commerce, the Kansas City Star reports. His use of a cellphone to snap sexually explicit photos of two girls and paying them with money also hit the "federal nexus," prosecutors say. The condom brands were included in the FBI's criminal complaint the way guns often are. "The gun traveling is analogous to the condom traveling," says a law professor and former federal prosecutor. "The person who pulled the trigger may not have traveled, but the gun did. This police officer may not have traveled, but an aspect that he used to commit the crime did." Whitley claimed he didn't know one of the girls was 14 when they had sex over a four-month period in 2015, but investigators suggested that her braces could have tipped him off. He met the other girl, a 16-year-old runaway, at a party where runaways prostituted themselves to older men. She says she gave him oral sex five times for $60 to $65 each. The Chicago Sun-Times reports that Whitley, a 20-year veteran of the Chicago PD, will be sentenced in September.