A 59-year-old Port Townsend man is facing two felony charges of communication with a minor for immoral purposes and one charge of second-degree attempted rape of a child  after police allege he tried to lure multiple young girls back to his boat and made plans to have sex with a 13-year-old girl.

Gregory Gaetano Cremarosa was arrested July 1 at Chetzemoka Park during a sting operation overseen by the Port Townsend Police Department.

The arrest followed a series of text messages Cremarosa allegedly sent to an undercover officer posing as a 13-year-old.

Police were alerted to Cremarosa after multiple groups of young girls reported he’d approached them and had been acting “creepy.”

Following the reports, Port Townsend police contacted the Washington State Patrol for assistance.

Two detectives from the State Patrol’s High Tech Crimes Unit contacted one of the girls Cremarosa had approached and were able to make contact with him via text message.

Using the girl’s phone, detectives were able to introduce a fictitious persona of a 13-year-old named “Leah” for the investigation.

According to a statement of probable cause filed in Jefferson County Superior Court, over the course of about a week, Cremarosa allegedly engaged in increasingly explicit sexual conversations with the undercover officer posing as the 13-year-old.

In the conversations, Cremarosa allegedly said initially that the two couldn’t have sex due to the girl’s age, but later described in graphic detail his intent to have sex.

According to the charging documents, Cremarosa acknowledges at multiple points the matter of Leah’s age, saying “No, your ag [sic] is not important.”

On July 1, detectives arranged for Cremarosa to meet the 13-year-old at Chetzemoka Park in Port Townsend.

Upon arriving at the park, he allegedly texted the detectives, “I am here baby.” While approaching the entrance to the park, officers arrested Cremarosa and he was taken into custody.

After his arrest, police sent a text message from the undercover officer’s phone to Cremarosa’s phone and discovered that he had input the name of the officer’s undercover alias as “Leah 13.”

While en-route to the meet with the underaged girl, Cremarosa was also observed driving erratically, officers administered tests for driving under the influence and determined that Cremarosa had a blood alcohol content of 0.16.

He has since been charged with DUI.

During a court appearance Friday that lasted less than
2 minutes, Cremarosa entered pleadings of not guilty to the charges.

A trial date of Aug. 30 was set.