Marine charged with sexual exploitation of children bonds out of Colorado jail; investigators think there are more victims
A U.S. Marine arrested at a Marine Corps base in California was recently extradited to Colorado, where he's now charged with multiple counts related to sexual exploitation of children. He has since bonded out of jail. Investigators believe there are more victims.
Justin Ryder Simmons, 19, of Windsor, was arrested in June at Marine Corps Base Camp Pendleton in San Diego and extradited to Arapahoe County. He was booked into the Arapahoe County Detention Facility on June 27.
An arrest warrant was issued, and he's now charged with two counts of sexual exploitation of a child - induce/entice, possession of child sexual exploitation material, and two counts of internet sexual exploitation of a child; all felonies, court records show.
He bonded out of the Arapahoe County Detention Facility on a $25,000 bond on June 29 and was formally charged on July 3.
According to a partially redacted arrest report obtained by CBS News Colorado on Wednesday, Simmons is accused of offering to give vapes and drugs to at least one middle school-aged child in exchange for sexual acts. He then allegedly threatened to rape the child and their family if they showed the messages to anyone else.
Those text and social media conversations allegedly took place in January 2025.
Copies of messages Simmons allegedly sent include questions and offers of a sexually explicit nature and sent pictures -- both in his Marine Corps uniform and nude from the waist down -- to at least one alleged victim, according to that arrest report.
Additional photos appear to show Simmons' face while in uniform, with text across the images of a sexually explicit nature, according to his arrest report. More photos show tattoos on Simmons' body that investigators used to help identify him.
Conversations between school police officers and one of the child's parents indicate that the child believed- at least initially -\- that the person they were talking to was also a minor.
The minors' names are redacted, and CBS News Colorado doesn't identify victims or alleged victims of sexual assault.
The Arapahoe County Sheriff's Office believes there are more victims out there and is urging them to come forward to law enforcement. The Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force says Simmons used the Snapchat username of "simmonsj6842" and phone number 970-308-5998 to contact the alleged victims.
Contact information for Simmons' attorney could not be located, and the law firm's website was down for maintenance. A voicemail seeking comment was left at the phone number listed by investigators.
Simmons' rank and current standing with the U.S. Marine Corps following his arrest weren't clear. A Marine Corps spokesperson referred questions to Camp Pendleton, but a spokesperson for that base hadn't yet responded to an emailed request for comment.
Cody Harnish is a U.S. Army veteran and former judge advocate general -- a military attorney -- who lived in Denver before enlisting in the Army. He now works as a private attorney representing members of the military in court. Without knowing details of Simmons' case, he explained what typically happens when servicemembers are accused of crimes and arrested.
When a servicemember is arrested for crimes allegedly committed outside of their military service, that military branch is likely to "administratively separate" that servicemember.
"Administrative separation is a military term of basically saying, 'your employer is firing you because you've been accused of misconduct outside of the job,'" Harnish said.
Servicemembers can be separated from the military under three categories when this happens; an honorable discharge, "which definitely is not going to happen here," Harnish said; general discharge, where servicemembers lose some education benefits; or an "other than honorable" discharge, of which there's a "99.9% chance" of happening in Simmons' case, Harnish said.
An other than honorable discharge means a servicemember loses all of their military benefits, even without a civilian criminal court conviction. This can happen after just an arrest and formal criminal charges for certain alleged crimes, according to Harnish.
Simmons will likely be called back to Camp Pendleton and placed under "restricted status," only being allowed to leave to attend court hearings in Colorado, Harnish says, and soon after will be notified that he's being kicked out of the military.
If convicted of any of the felony charges, Simmons will be ineligible to reenlist in any branch of the military, unless a waiver is granted, which Harnish says is unlikely for charges of this nature.
He's due back in Arapahoe County Court on Aug. 5.