Student reporters catch sex offender

A 22-year-old man occasionally visits a Minnesota high school and poses as a 17-year-old "prospective student" and British royalty - until smart school newspaper reporters do a little Web research on him. That's the story told by KARE TV in the Twin Cities. "At the school newspaper, they thought, if Caspian's story were true, it certainly would make an interesting feature." They found his MySpace.com page, headed the "Earl of Scooby." Next he turned up in Florida's registry of sex offenders. He turned out to be Joshua Gardner, of Austin, Minnesota, "convicted of fourth-degree criminal sexual conduct in Winona County in 2003." Though the principal said there were no reports of any student harassment during his three visits to the school, KARE reports that he's been charged for violating probation, and " his probation officer is recommending that he go to prison for 21 months, which is the sentence that was stayed after his conviction back in 2003."