‘Spend the night’: New details show Beaufort Co. fireman messaged teen multiple times
“I’m smitten,” Beaufort County firefighter Brandon Thomsen wrote in a Snapchat message to a 13-year-old girl, according to court testimony.
The teenager said he was acting weird. The two were longtime family friends.
Thomsen, 46, wrote that he was in love with her.
“I’m just a kid. Are you doing this to other girls?” she asked him in a message in November 2020.
Thomsen said no and later requested she send nude pictures of herself.
The teenager reported the multiple messages to police. A few days later, the Beaufort Police Department put out a press release saying the agency had warrants for Thomsen’s arrest on charges of soliciting sex from a minor and disseminating obscene material to a minor.
He went to Brunswick, Ga., in an attempt to evade police capture but was ultimately found and arrested.
The messages and their aftermath were detailed in a preliminary hearing Friday in Beaufort County Magistrate Court to determine whether police had probable cause for criminal charges.
Beaufort Police revealed enough of the evidence for a magistrate to find cause for the charges, but a trial will determine Thomsen’s guilt.
‘You can’t let my wife know’
Thomsen and the victim, who is not identified to protect her privacy, were close family friends, according to police.
Then a firefighter with the Burton Fire District, he showed the 13-year-old his “Snapcode” so that they could become friends on the social media platform, said Beaufort Police investigator Stephanie Karafa.
“After they became Snapchat friends, he made the comment, something to the effect of, ‘you can’t let my wife know that we’re talking on here,’” said Karafa.
The several messages took place on Nov. 26-28, 2020.
Karafa read off screenshots of the Snapchat messages in the hearing.
She said Thomsen messaged that he wanted to have sex with the 13-year-old, referenced the size of his genitalia several times, and commented on specific body parts of hers.
The teenager refused his advances.
Thomsen apologized, said he was mistaken, and that he accidentally messaged her while trying to have a different conversation on his OnlyFans account, according to Karafa. OnlyFans is a social media platform popularized as a platform for sex workers, celebrities, influencers and their “fans.”
His wife confronted him “before he fled the area,” and he said he sent the messages to the wrong person.
Search warrants revealed Thomsen then picked up a rental car at the Savannah Airport and bought a new cellphone on Dec. 1, 2020, said Karafa.
His wife told police that his original cellphone and two laptops were missing from the home. The devices “were never recovered” after Thomsen was arrested, according to Karafa.
Karafa said he tried to harm himself in the rental vehicle, and he ended up in a hospital in Brunswick, Ga.
Probable cause
On Dec. 11, 2020, the Burton Fire District fired Thomsen for violating rules related to “immoral or indecent conduct,” according to his termination letter.
Thomsen’s defense attorney, Columbia-based lawyer Jack Swerling, made a motion to throw out both charges against Thomsen.
He argued that police did not have enough evidence to prove that Thomsen was the one sending the messages and that Thomsen accidentally sent them to the wrong person.
The judge denied the motions and said the evidence was enough for probable cause.
The Beaufort Police Department said it is continuing to gather evidence in the case.
This story was originally published February 28, 2021 at 5:15 AM.
