Scott Barrett

According to court records for his current charges, he was born on August 21, 1963. However, according to the Michigan Sex Offender Registry, he was born on August 02, 1963. According to public voter records, he voted in the 2024 election.

In 2011, an undercover federal agent received child pornography that Barrett had posted on the internet. Agents searched his home and found a "substantial" amount of child pornography on his computer. He pleaded guilty in 2013 to child pornography-related charges. He served four and half years in federal prison for these charges. During his prison time, Barrett did not suffer repercussions from other inmates because he was placed in housing with other child predators. In 2018, Barrett was arrested in a Michigan State Police prostitution sting. He was given probation and a fine.

Barrett went to a hotel to meet the decoy, but was apprehended as soon as he got to the room's door. In order to not disturb other guests, police made sure to be quiet and quick. While being detained, Barrett kept repeating that he was only there for a massage.

During the interview with Chris Hansen , Barrett claimed that he did not see when the decoy said she was fifteen. He claimed that he was driving and did not look carefully at the messages. Chris pushed back, however, saying that according to Barrett's own timeline, he would have been at home at the time the decoy said her age.

Chris questioned Barrett about his previous child pornography conviction, asking why he would be attracted to minors. Barrett stated that many of the girls he had pictures of looked older than they were. Chris asked him if he knew that viewing child porn was, itself, the re-victimization of a child, to which Barrett said that he did know but that he went therapy and learned from his mistakes. Chris brought up the glaring irony that if Barrett had learned his lesson, he wouldn't have gone to the hotel to meet a minor for sex. Barrett again claimed that he did not see the age, but Chris did not believe him. Barrett said that his previous conviction and registry status did not matter.

Chris questioned why, if Barrett did not know that the decoy was a minor, he would be so concerned that the decoy could be law enforcement. Barrett replied, "Because if something else happened, I didn't want to... do anything." He clarified that "do anything" meant "have sex." Chris then questioned whether Barrett learned anything at all from his time in prison if he was still engaging in illegal sexual behavior. Barrett rejected the idea that he did not learn his lesson. However, even if Barrett had not seen that the decoy was a minor, he still admitted to being nervous about possibly soliciting an adult prostitute, for which he was also convicted of several years prior. Barrett denied Chris' accusation of him being a predator and also claimed that he did not care how many times Chris heard similar excuses. Barrett also said that he struggled to find women to have sex with so he instead would find prostitutes because "that's their job." Chris then told Barrett that he did not have "rizz."

When asked what should happen to him, Barrett said that he should only get charged with soliciting a prostitute. Barrett, turning "offender advocate" according to Chris, then argued that putting all child sex offenders into the same category of being predators was wrong. Barrett likened his situation to a person who accidentally ran over a pedestrian and a serial mass murderer as being in the same category, saying that it is wrong to group them as the same and similarly wrong to group child sex offenders. Barrett claimed that he did not still have a problem with being attracted to minors and would be willing to take a polygraph to show that he did not know the decoy's age. He also claimed to have not viewed or possessed child pornography since his prior arrest for it in 2011.

After being taken into custody by deputies, his phone was searched and child pornography was found. It was also found that he deleted several messages with the decoy, including the one where the decoy said her age.

Child Commercial Sexual Activity Using a Computer to Commit a Crime Tampering With Evidence Accosting a Child for Immoral Purposes Possession of Child Sexually Abusive Material (x2) Habitual Offender

Barrett posted a $1,000 bond and was released on March 21, 2025. He has two cases still ongoing as of July 8, 2025.