Columbia woman charged with enticing minor to engage in sexual activity

NICOLE ZAPPONE, The Chronicle, Willimantic, Conn.
·2 min read

COLUMBIA — A woman from Columbia was charged recently in the case of using the social platform Discord to entice a minor to engage in sexual activity.

Vanessa Roberts Avery, U.S. Attorney for the District of Connecticut, Robert Fuller, special agent in charge of the New Haven division of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, and Connecticut State Police Colonel Daniel Loughman announced that Alyson Cranick, 43, of Columbia, was charged by a federal complaint with enticement of a minor to engage in sexual activity.

Cranick’s federal court appearance was scheduled for Wednesday in New Haven. She was arrested on related state charges on Nov. 14, 2023, and has been detained in state custody since Nov. 28, 2023.

According to court documents and statements made in court, Cranick first used text messaging and Snapchat, then continued to Discord to entice an 11-year-old boy to engage in sexually explicit conduct with her.

Snapchat is a platform where users can chat and send pictures. Discord is an instant messaging and VoIP social platform where users can communicate over voice calls, video calls, text messages and media.

Court records showed that several times during the summer of 2022, the minor victim snuck out of his house after midnight to meet with Cranick to engage in sexual activity.

Between July and October 2022, Cranick exchanged more than 4,700 messages with the boy on Discord.

The charge of enticement of a minor to engage in sexual activity carries a mandatory minimum term of imprisonment of 10 years and a maximum term of imprisonment of life.

The matter is being investigated by the FBI’s Child Exploitation Task Force and the Connecticut State Police’s Eastern District Major Crime Unit. The FBI’s Child Exploitation Task Force includes federal, state and local law enforcement agencies.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Daniel E. Cummings is prosecuting the case through the U.S. Department of Justice’s Project Safe Childhood Initiative, which is aimed at protecting children from sexual abuse and exploitation.