Man faces charges in sex abuse, filming of boy on phone

A 53-year-old convicted sex offender accused of making videos of young boys in a public restroom in California has been arrested in Las Vegas.

Kent Douglas Preston, 53, was arrested on Dec. 29 in Las Vegas on suspicion of sexually assaulting a child under 14, lewdness with a child under 14, first degree kidnapping, child abuse and using a minor under 14 to produce pornography, the Metropolitan Police Department reported.

Preston is being held at the Clark County Detention Center on $500,000 bail, according to jail records.

His troubles began in California on Aug. 11, when the Newport Beach Police Department took a call about an incident inside a public bathroom by a beach at the city’s Corona Del Mar neighborhood, Las Vegas police said in an arrest report.

The caller reported that a man later identified at Preston was using a cellphone to record young boys in the restroom. Preston was later arrested and booked in Newport Beach, and police obtained a search warrant to examine his Galaxy Samsung mobile device.

Then on Dec. 29, a Newport Beach police detective phoned a Las Vegas detective with the department’s sex offender unit to report finding several videos and photographs on Preston’s Samsung showing what looked like a a pre-teen male, police said.

Some of the images could be considered pornographic, depicting sexual abuse, while others where not, but the Newport Beach detective was able to hear the juvenile’s name mentioned on the audio, according to police.

Las Vegas detectives researched the boy’s name, identified him through a photograph provided by Clark County School Police and later discovered his legal guardian and mother.

After reviewing the metadata of the videos, detectives learned that the recordings had been made in April 2022 in Las Vegas.

Authorities said the videos showed Preston holding down the boy as the child attempted to resist, police said. Preston, in one instance wrestled the boy to his back, forced his knees to his chest, pulled his pants down, digitally penetrated him and prevented him from escaping, they said.

In another scene on a video in Preston’s phone, the suspect rubbed the boy’s buttocks and in yet another part, digitally penetrated the boy again, police said.

Las Vegas police said they decided they had probable cause to arrest Preston, since he was back in town and might resume abusing the victim. Detectives surveyed his home and ultimately arrested him when he returned there in a Jeep Grand Cherokee vehicle.

A detective interviewed the alleged juvenile victim on Dec. 29, who positively identified Preston from snips of video from the suspect’s mobile phone, police said.

Later that day, police also interviewed Preston and afterward arrested him and booked him into the detention center.

Contact Jeff Burbank at jburbank@reviewjournal.com and 702-383-0382. Follow him @JeffBurbank2 on Twitter.