BY DARRELL HALEN

A Florida man faces at least 10 years behind bars after being convicted of luring a 15-year-old girl from her Windham home.

Following a three-day trial, Daniel M. Lenz, 26, of Jacksonville, Fla., was convicted in U.S. District Court in Concord. He had been charged with causing the transportation of a minor in interstate commerce for the purpose of engaging in illicit sexual misconduct.

In March, Windham police were notified that the girl had run away from home. Investigators discovered that she was on her way to Florida to meet Lenz.

Authorities met up with her in South Carolina. They claimed that another Florida man, Jason Dowling, 23, had been sent by Lenz to pick up the girl in New Hampshire and bring her to Lenz’s home in Jacksonville.

Windham police and the FBI determined that the girl had been communicating with Lenz through World of Warcraft, an online interactive video game, before she ran away.

The case against Lenz was brought as part of Project Safe Childhood, a nationwide initiative to protect children from online exploitation and abuse.

“When Congress passed the Protect Act, it emphasized the importance of prosecuting those individuals who use the Internet to prey on minors by increasing the punishment for such crimes,” Thomas Colantuono, U.S. Attorney for New Hampshire, said in a statement. “This office will continue to dedicate its resources to prosecuting those individuals who travel the interstate with the purpose of engaging in sex with minors. Prosecuting such individuals will remove them and the danger they pose and will provide a significant deterrent to those who may consider taking advantage of our children.”

Colantuono praised the work of the Windham police, the FBI, the Cyber-Crime Unit of the Florida Attorney General’s Office and the Jacksonville Sheriff’s Department.

Lenz will be sentenced on Dec. 18. The case was prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Helen Fitzgibbon.