BOSTON — A former Social Security Administration employee in Massachusetts has been sentenced to federal prison for using his job to try and recruit a disabled mother seeking government benefits across state lines for paid sex, federal officials said.
Dae Sung Kim, 36, of Auburn, was sentenced to six months in prison and five years of supervised release, U.S. Attorney Leah Foley said in a statement on Friday. U.S. District Court Judge Margaret Guzman handed down his sentence.
Kim pleaded guilty in February to one count of attempting to induce a person to travel in interstate commerce to engage in prostitution.
“Public servants are entrusted to assist people, not exploit them. This was a brazen abuse of power by a federal employee who used his position and access to sensitive information to prey on a vulnerable woman who had just lost her job,” Foley said.
“This kind of predatory behavior has no place in public service, or anywhere else,” Foley said. “This case represents yet another example of my office’s commitment to reduce the demand for commercial exploitation. Mr. Kim attempted to purchase access to the victim’s body and used her vulnerability and his privilege to do so.”
Social Security Administration Acting Inspector General Michelle Anderson called Kim’s actions echoed Foley’s comments.
“This was a shocking abuse of power by someone entrusted to serve the public,” Anderson said. “The defendant, while employed as an SSA claims specialist, attempted to exploit a vulnerable, disabled mother seeking to apply for reinstatement of disability benefits after losing her job. This predatory behavior is intolerable.”
Kim was arrested and charged by criminal complaint in October and subsequently charged in December.
In March 2024, Kim met with a woman at the Gardner Social Security Administration field office who was seeking Social Security benefits after losing her job, prosecutors said.
After redirecting the woman to another Social Security Administration field office near her home in another state, Kim called her from his personal cell phone using the phone number he obtained from his agency’s computer system, prosecutors said.
“On the call, Kim said he understood the beneficiary was in a ‘difficult situation’ and that ‘maybe they could work something out that would benefit them both,’” the U.S. Attorney said in her statement.
Then, in text messages and also during a subsequent call monitored by law enforcement, Kim said “that he was proposing to pay the beneficiary for sex and attempted to negotiate a price,” prosecutors said.
Kim continued soliciting the woman over a period of several months through text messages with undercover law enforcement impersonating the beneficiary, including several requests for nude photographs that were declined, prosecutors said.
Eventually, Kim suggested that the woman travel to Massachusetts to meet him in a hotel parking lot in Fitchburg, offering to pay her $100 to have sex in a car in the parking lot, prosecutors said.
Kim traveled to the hotel parking lot to meet the woman in October. There, law enforcement officers arrested him.
This is a developing story. Check back for updates as more information becomes available.
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