Former American Airlines official gets prison in Pittsburgh area child-sex case

A former senior manager for American Airlines who arranged to have sex with what he thought was a woman and her 10-year-old daughter during a June 2015 business trip to the Pittsburgh area will spend 10 years in prison, a federal judge ruled Wednesday.

Ray Wickliffe Howland, 57, of Arlington, Texas, placed an online sex ad targeting the Moon area that said, in part: “I'd love to find a mother/daughter, pair (or more) of sisters, or a couple of young women that were interested in getting together for some fun tonight.”

Investigators in the attorney general's Child Predator Section saw the ad, and an undercover agent posed as a 32-year-old woman and her 10-year-old daughter. In subsequent text messages with someone Howland thought was the daughter, Howland gave graphic descriptions of the sex acts he wanted to perform.

Police arrested Howland on June 26, 2015, when he showed up for a meeting with the undercover agent at a Sheetz store on University Boulevard in Moon.

“I would just like to apologize to my family and my friends and the court for my behavior,” Howland said Wednesday during his sentencing in federal court in Pittsburgh. U.S. District Judge Gustave Diamond also sentenced him to 10 years of probation.

Howland was escorted out of the courtroom by federal marshals.

The judge also ordered Howland to register as a sex offender. Probation officers were ordered to monitor Howland's computer use to see if he attempts to access child pornography or arrange for another sexual encounter.

Howland received some of the first calls about the hijacking of American Airlines Flight 11 when it crashed into the North Tower of the World Trade Center on 9/11 and is mentioned in several footnotes of the 9/11 Commission's report.

Until the June 2015 incident, he apparently led a spotless life, his lawyer, Frank C. Walker, said after the hearing.

During an interview at the Moon police station after his arrest, Howland said he had posted the ad at least twice before, but this was the first time he had set up an encounter, according to court documents.

Nothing in the government's evidence or his own investigation turned up anything else suggesting Howland had shown a sexual interest in children, Walker said.

“There's no explanation,” he said.

Brian Bowling is a Tribune-Review staff writer. Reach him at 412-325-4301 or bbowling@tribweb.com.