By Reed Williams and Staff Reports
Media General News Service

Authorities today arrested a man in a case in which someone left a note under a Goochland County bridge promising to perform oral sex on “white Goochland boys.”

Vernard Jefferson Kirby, 47, of Old River Trail in Powhatan County, was charged with using a cell phone to solicit oral sex from someone he believed was a 14-year-old boy, authorities said.

According to Goochland Sheriff James L. Agnew, a resident last week found the note under the U.S. 522 bridge over the James River, known as Maidens Bridge. The note contained several contact numbers.

A Goochland deputy began a text-message dialogue with Kirby and set up a meeting for today near the bridge, an area popular for fishing and which is frequented by teenagers,
Agnew said. An undercover Chesterfield County police officer posing as a 14-year-old boy met Kirby there about 4:30 p.m.

Authorities accuse Kirby of proposing to perform sex acts during the conversation with the undercover officer. Kirby was then taken into custody by hidden deputies.

Agnew said a Chesterfield officer was used because he was young-looking and was unlikely to be recognized in Goochland.

Kirby was jailed without bond in Henrico County. He has a preliminary hearing set for March 29 in Goochland General District Court.