Ex-Homeland Security Agent Gets 8 Years for Molestation of Girls in Irvine

An inmate looks out from prison bars. (Peter Macdiarmid/Getty Images)

SANTA ANA, Calif.—A former Homeland Security employee was sentenced to eight years in prison April 19 for molesting two girls and inappropriately touching another victim in Irvine.

Terry Edward Keegan, 60, was convicted March 23 of a felony count of lewd acts on a minor younger than 14 as well as single misdemeanor counts each of child annoyance, sexual battery, simple battery, and destroying or concealing evidence.

Keegan was given credit for 516 days behind bars so far. Orange County Superior Court Judge Andre Manssourian also ordered Keegan to register as a sex offender for the next 20 years.

Keegan faced three, six, or eight years in prison. Manssourian rejected a plea for probation for the Army veteran and former reserve Orange County deputy sheriff. Keegan worked for the U.S. Department of Homeland Security in the Transportation Security Administration and Immigration Services.

Victim’s Mother

The mother of one of the victims, who lost custody of her daughter and son due to alcohol and drug addiction issues, told Manssourian of her frustration coming to grips with what happened when her mother, the longtime girlfriend of Keegan’s, took custody of the children.

“I have to live with a certain amount of guilt for any of this happening,” she said. “I have a lot of anger, though, because the kids were taken from me and I was told I was unfit, that they were going to be protected from me and I had no idea it was quite the opposite.”

She said her daughter’s usual optimistic outlook has faded.

“I had to watch the light go out of my daughter’s eyes,” she said. “That part of her that was my favorite, the positivity—that part of her is gone.”

Keegan’s crimes have “ripped apart our family,” she said.

The victim’s mother said her daughter did not want to come forward and intended to “carry that burden” because she did not want to wreck her grandmother’s relationship or attract attention from child protective services again.

“I don’t understand how they allowed him back into the household” after the first allegations surfaced, she said. “They yanked my kids away from me for way less.”

Manssourian told her, “I see the irony of what you’re saying. I get why you’re angry and your bitterness.”

The judge told her he was impressed with how the victim carried herself in testimony.

“You’ve got a good kid,” he said. “She made a good impression on me.”

Defendant’s Arguments

Keegan’s attorney, Jay Moorhead of the Orange County Public Defender’s Office, argued for probation, citing how the defendant grew up with an abusive alcoholic father as well as his lack of a criminal record and public service. The defendant’s parents split up when Keegan was 13.

But Deputy District Attorney Juliet Oliver said Keegan used his governmental employee status as “a veil” to create a false sense of security for the parents of victims. Keegan also exploited the vulnerability of his girlfriend’s granddaughter, Oliver argued.

The victim “did not want to rock the boat. She wanted to put her head down and endure the abuse and the defendant took advantage of that vulnerability,” Oliver said.

Oliver also noted how Keegan wiped out data from his devices with special tools that forensic experts could not recover.

Manssourian said the defendant’s public service both worked in his favor and also against him in the case.

“It turns out the fox was guarding the hen house,” Manssourian said of the community trusting the Homeland Security employee.

The judge also said, “One wonders what was on those hard drives [that Keegan destroyed].”

“How much were you able to spare yourself from more serious prison time because you were able to eliminate evidence on that hard drive?” Manssourian said. “That’s a cloud hanging over this case.”

Victims’ Testimony

One of the victims had lived with Keegan since she was about 4 years old, and her grandmother took custody of her, she testified. The other two victims were friends of hers, according to Oliver.

One of the friends told a doctor in 2016 that Keegan would pick her up and molest her when she would visit with the defendant’s relative when she was 8 to 10 years old, Oliver said. The doctor called Irvine police, but they did not follow up, and “the investigation fell through the cracks,” Oliver said in her opening statement of the trial.

The victim also told investigators that once, while at a community pool, Keegan began taking pictures of her and her sister and said he was “testing out a new camera,” Oliver said.

Irvine police were contacted again in the spring of 2021 after his relative and her friend were hanging around during spring break, Oliver said. The two were 16 at the time.

Keegan also made inappropriate comments to one of the girls and insisted on taking her out to shop for bathing suits, the prosecutor said. He called around to stores during the coronavirus pandemic to see which ones had fitting rooms, she said.

When they were at the pool, one of the girls saw him trying to take a picture of her and she said to stop, Oliver said. But Keegan allegedly said she looked cute and asked her to pose with the girl he lived with.

The friend told the girl who was living with the defendant that just before Easter he had touched her buttocks, Oliver said.

When one girl told her mother, she called the police in April 2021, Oliver said. The girl said Keegan would often make “inappropriate” comments about her body and breast size over the five years the girls were friends.

The relative said she found a vibrator in his bedroom while she was looking for scissors when she was in the sixth grade and he told her it was for an ex-girlfriend and that he was saving it for her, Oliver said.

The girl also recounted how Keegan would often expose himself, walking around nude in his bedroom, which was across from hers, and that once when they were in a hotel she saw him masturbating in the bed next to hers, Oliver said. Keegan also took her to the sex toy part of a Spencer’s store once and told her she would enjoy the devices, Oliver said.

The girl testified that he once slipped his tongue in her mouth while kissing her good night when she was 12.

She said he was the only “father figure” she has ever had and that she would call him “grampa.”

The accuser also said, “I still love him.”