Santa Rosa suspect arrested on gun charges, contacting girls on social media for sex

SANTA ROSA -- An investigation into a firearms trafficking scheme in Santa Rosa discovered additional evidence the suspect was also contacting minors to engage in sex acts, police said Tuesday.

Santa Rosa police said investigators developed information last month that a resident, identified as 24-year-old Luis Morales-Vargas - was possibly trafficking firearms. Detectives contacted Morales-Vargas at his job at around 11:45 a.m. on August 4 and detained him without incident.

A search of Morales-Vargas's vehicle parked near the business turned up a loaded, concealed, and unregistered Glock handgun, police said in a press release. Later, a search of his home on the 1000 block of Dorrit Avenue in Santa Rosa yielded an unsecured handgun and a non-serialized "ghost gun" assault rifle. Police said several adults and children were in the home at the time.

During the investigation, detectives obtained information that Morales-Vargas was allegedly using social media apps to seek out underage girls to have sex with them. 

The evidence showed Morales-Vargas was sending obscene/harmful material to minors, contacting minors for sexual acts, and arranging meetings to have sex with minors, according to police. Each of the girls was in her early teens. 

Morales-Vargas was booked into the Sonoma County Jail. He faces charges of carrying a concealed firearm in a vehicle, possession of an assault weapon, sending harmful material to a minor, contacting a minor for sex acts, abnormal sexual interest in children, and using a minor for sex.