Below is an official statement from the United States Attorney’s Office for the Middle District of Florida.
JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – Senior U.S. District Judge Timothy J. Corrigan sentenced Matthew Christopher Yates, 31, Hastings, of Hastings, to 15 years in federal prison for attempting to seduce a child and engage in explicit sex acts in order to make a video of his own sexual abuse. Yates was also ordered to serve 10 years of supervised release and register as a sex offender. Yates pled guilty on August 27, 2025. At the time of his arrest on March 11, 2022, Yates was employed as an 8th grade teacher at a St. Augustine school.
On February 11, 2022, an undercover FBI agent in Jacksonville who was posing online as a 14-year-old child responded to an online notification on a social media application posted by a user named “English Teacher,” who was later identified as Yates, according to court documents. The notice read, “Are there any women who would like to be evaluated by a teacher?” During this online text conversation, the “child” advised that “she” was 14 years old and in eighth grade, and Yates stated that she was a teacher and asked the “child”:[e]Would you like to fantasize about your teacher? ” Yates and the “kid” exchanged photos, with Yates remarking, “I bet you would look sexy in a bikini.”
Between February 22, 2022 and March 11, 2022, Yates and “Child” exchanged many more text messages, and Yates sent “Child” several sexually explicit photos. On March 8, 2022, Yates asked to meet the “child” in person and, when they met, detailed the specific sexual acts he intended to perform on the “child.”
Two days later, Yates and the “child” confirmed their plans to meet, and Yates asked the “child” if he would like to video record the scheduled sexual act so that the “child” would “better remember it.” Yates told the “child” that he could use his cell phone to record the sex act and that he would later delete the video so no one could see it.
On March 11, 2022, Yates drove to a pre-arranged location in Jacksonville to meet a “child” for sex and was arrested by FBI agents. A search revealed that Yates had brought several condoms and a cell phone with him. Yates admitted in an interview that he intended to meet a 14-year-old girl he met online and that he intended to have sex with “her.” When asked if he intended to have sex with the 14-year-old girl and record it on video, Yates said: “I said I could if she wanted to,” and “I just wanted to let her do it.” He admitted that it was his idea to make the video of his sexual encounters with “children.”
The case was investigated by the Federal Bureau of Investigation in Jacksonville. This case was prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorney D. Rodney Brown.
The lawsuit was filed as part of Project Safe Childhood, a nationwide initiative launched by the Department of Justice to combat the epidemic of child sexual exploitation and abuse. Led by the U.S. Attorney’s Office and the Criminal Division’s Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section, Project Safe Childhood mobilizes federal, state, and local resources to identify, arrest, and prosecute individuals who sexually exploit children and to identify, rescue, and seek justice for child victims. For more information about Project Safe Childhood, visit www.justice.gov/psc.
