ST. GEORGE — A Nevada man accused of traveling to Southern Utah to sexually abuse a juvenile is being held in jail in Washington County following his arrest in April. Investigators believe there is evidence the suspect may have committed similar crimes in other states as well.
The suspect, Thomas John Snyder, 43, of Reno, was scheduled to make an initial appearance in 5th District Court last week facing multiple first-degree felony charges, including one count each of rape, sodomy on a child and sexual abuse of a child. He also faced one count of dealing in harmful materials to a minor, a third-degree felony.
The investigation began in March when detectives received a report alleging that Snyder had sexually abused a juvenile living in Washington County after communicating with the youth through a messaging app, according to the affidavit filed in support of the arrest warrant.
Detectives said they recovered sexually explicit messages and images sent from Snyder to the minor during a data search of the the adolescent’s cell phone.
At the end of March, detectives learned a male named “Tom” had reached out to the youth on Instagram asking if she would model for him. The man reportedly told the girl he would take photos of the girl at a motel and would pay her $500.
Snyder allegedly traveled from his home in Reno and took the juvenile to a motel in St. George and told her she could leave after taking the photos, but “he did not let her leave,” the detective noted.
Instead, the minor was handcuffed and sexually assaulted, according to detectives. Investigators also checked with the motel that had a room that matching the one described by the juvenile. They also requested a photo of Snyder from emergency dispatch in Nevada, which also matched the description provided by the victim.
The suspect was described as having a neon green mohawk and several face tattoos and piercings, a gray beard and a “demonic star-circle” tattoo on his stomach. Prior to the meeting, the juvenile believed the Snyder was 23 years-old, and it was only after meeting in-person the girl realized he was older.
Investigators also discovered that Snyder’s vehicle was caught on a license plate reader near Red Hills Parkway shortly after 2 a.m. on the day of the alleged the incident.
After executing a search warrant on the suspect’s social media account, investigators recovered the conversation between Snyder and the juvenile in Washington County. In addition, detectives allegedly found a message thread between Snyder and a teenage girl in Missouri that took place last year in August.
According to the report, the suspect sent similar messages to the Missouri teen asking if he could take explicit photos of the girl in exchange for money.
Investigators also recovered images and videos of another young girl in the more than 600 pages of data recovered during the forensic analysis conducted by police, the court record continued. The analysis revealed that since 2019, Snyder was using social media to reach out to underaged girls with offers to meet, take photos or to sexually abuse them in exchange for money.
Based on the number of possible victims, combined with the volume of evidence collected that spanned over the course of at least five years, investigators believed that Snyder posed “an active threat to young women, not only in the Washington County area, but across the nation.”
On April 25, detectives requested that a no-bail warrant be issued for the suspect’s arrest so that Snyder would be returned to Utah to face that charges filed in Washington County. Snyder was arrested the following day by officers in Reno. Santa Clara-Ivins investigators travelled to Reno to interview the suspect on April 27.
On May 11, Snyder was extradited back to Utah and he was booked into jail in Washington County.
During a hearing held last week, the judge ordered that bail would be set at $100,000 and Snyder was scheduled to appear for a waiver hearing.
This report is based on statements from court records, police or other responders and may not contain the full scope of findings. Persons arrested or charged are presumed innocent until found guilty in a court of law or as otherwise decided by a trier-of-fact.
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