Deputies say the quick thinking of two teenage boys led them to arrest a Lakeland man accused of offering them money in exchange for sex.
Michael Jenny, 49, is facing charges of lewd and lascivious conduct, contributing to the delinquency of a minor and soliciting another for prostitution.
According to the Polk County Sheriff's Office, the boys, ages 13 and 15, were walking in the Winn-Dixie plaza at Combee Road and U.S. 19 on Tuesday when they were approached by an adult man in a newer model sedan.
The man honked the horn, then threw a note out of the window at the boys, deputies said. The note offered to pay them $60 in cash if they would meet him in the CVS parking lot and perform a "lewd act with him," the report said.
Deputies said the boys walked to CVS and approached the car, and then while one of the boys talked to the driver, the other wrote down the vehicle's tag number.
The boys then told the driver they wanted more money in an effort to get him to leave. Deputies said the driver left to go to an ATM, and the teens went inside CVS and called 911 to report what had happened.
Deputies arrived and spoke to the boys, who told them they had never seen the man before. The teens gave the deputies the note, the description of the vehicle, the vehicle tag number and a description of the driver.
Deputies said they were able to identify the driver as Jenny, and that the teenagers identified him as the suspect.
Jenny was arrested at his home. Deputies said he confessed, and that they found additional notes in his car that he wrote "while trying to get the courage to ask" the teens for the lewd acts.
Jenny is being held in the Polk County Jail without bond. His first appearance is scheduled for Thursday.
Deputies said Jenny has previously been arrested in 2005 for impersonating a law enforcement officer, kidnapping and carrying a concealed firearm.