Owatonna Sex Offender Charged For Allegedly Planning Murder Plot

Minneapolis, MN (KROC-AM News) - A federal criminal complaint has been filed against an Owatonna sex offender for sending graphic threats detailing a murder plot against his former child sexual abuse victim.

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Court documents show that in March of 2021 Upper Allen Township Police Department in Pennsylvania began investigating 26-year-old Michael Kurkowski regarding the communication and exchange of sexually explicit images of a minor.

The investigation revealed that Kurkowski possessed sexually explicit images and videos of a minor and was aware that his victim was, at the time, a minor under the age of 18. Kurkowski admitted to traveling to Pennsylvania to locate the minor and to try to continue a “relationship” after the minor attempted to end the online communications with Kurkowski.

In April 2021, Kurkowski was charged in Cumberland County, Pennsylvania, with multiple felonies related to the sexual exploitation of the minor and was sentenced to 142 days in prison followed by probation. Kurkowski’s probation conditions included the requirement to register as a sex offender, refraining from behavior which may present a danger to others, and not possessing weapons.

Court documents show that in December 2021 law enforcement began investigating Kurkowski’s online communications and sexual exploitation of a minor in East Peoria, Illinois.

In January 2022, the East Peoria Police Department (EPPD) reviewed several messages from Kurkowski to the minor describing in graphic detail a plan to travel to Pennsylvania where Kurkowski would murder the parents of his former victim, rape his sister, and then kill her in front of his former victim. EPPD also notified the Cedar Falls Police Department after the investigation revealed that Kurkowski was also engaging in the sexual exploitation of a second minor in Cedar Falls, Iowa.

According to court documents on February 4, 2022, investigators with the Owatonna Police Department learned that Kurkowski had purchased a Greyhound bus ticket and was en route to Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, the general location of Kurkowski’s former victim and his family. FBI investigators tracked Kurkowski’s whereabouts and found him at a bus stop in Toledo, Ohio where he was taken into custody.

According to court documents Kurkowski had with him a bag containing 16 heavy flex cuffs, electrical tape, a taser, a large knife, rubber gloves, hooded facemasks, among other things when he was arrested.

Kurkowski has been charged with one count of threatening interstate communication. Kurkowski made his initial appearance yesterday in the Northern District of Ohio. Kurkowski was ordered to be detained temporarily and removed to Minnesota, where he will make his initial appearance and have a detention and preliminary hearing at a later date.