MONROE — A Monroe man out on bond for meth and child porn charges is now also charged with breaking his conditions of bond by messaging dozens of people on Facebook soliciting drugs and sex, according to a new criminal complaint.
Brian Bahler, 31, was charged April 3 in Green County Circuit Court with 16 counts of felony bail jumping and eight misdemeanor counts of prostitution. He was arrested on a warrant in the case at about 1:45 p.m. April 21 in the 2500 block of 17th Avenue.
On Jan. 31, after being charged with nine felony counts of possessing child pornography, he posted a $10,000 cash bond and signed a $90,000 signature bond with conditions including no access to the internet.
Within weeks, however, the Green County Sheriff’s Office received a tip that he was accessing the internet. A deputy investigating the case got a warrant for Bahler’s Facebook account information.
Facebook fulfilled the warrant March 18 by sending 393 pages of Bahler’s Facebook activity. The deputy located 79 messages “of note” between Jan. 31 and March 2 that allegedly show Bahler seeking to pay for sex acts and for street drugs like methamphetamine and prescription pills like Adderall and Xanax.
Transcripts included with the criminal complaint show Bahler asked dozens of women to meet up for paid or unpaid sex or “$40 to find someone who will.”
The majority turned him down, with responses including “No,” “Hell no,” “My man would not approve,” “Leave me alone,” “Barking up the wrong tree buddy,” “Gross,” “Please stop messaging me. That is not how you talk to women,” “No thanks. I’m happily married,” “Yea that’s a big no” and, in one case, a series of laughing emojis.
In one message exchange, he offered a “finder’s fee” for getting drugs but was likewise turned down.
Several people he messaged mentioned hearing he’d been arrested for child porn images found on a cellphone in his possession. He repeatedly denied the allegations, explaining that “it was used phone” and photos from the previous owner hadn’t been deleted.
Police seized suspected meth and two phones from Bahler during a traffic stop Jan. 19 in the Town of Exeter and on one phone “located a large quantity of media ... which depicted obvious child pornography as well as images considered to be child erotica,” according to a deputy’s report.
Bahler has preliminary hearings scheduled for July 2 in the meth and child porn cases. Jonas Bednarek, a Madison criminal defense attorney in private practice, has been retained to represent Bahler in the bail jumping case.