Ex-coach admits Net perv charges

Vincent Mickle was 30 by the summer of 2007, but that didn't stop him from spending hours trying to pick up teenage girls on Facebook and MySpace.

Starting that summer and continuing to March 2010, Mickle, often claiming to be 18 and calling himself Vinnie or Vin, contacted at least six girls between the ages of 14 and 16, Assistant District Attorney Michael Stackow said during a court hearing yesterday.

Mickle, of Northeast Philadelphia, now 34, had sex with one 16-year-old girl at his home on Teesdale Street in July 2009. With the others, he asked for sex, gave them alcohol or got nude pictures from them, and he sent one girl a picture of his penis.

Mickle, once a volunteer coach of a Northeast girls' soccer team, yesterday admitted to his assorted online activities and pleaded guilty to a mountain of charges, including unlawful contact with a minor, possession of child pornography and related offenses.

Mickle, a single father of a 12-year-old daughter, will be sentenced Sept. 19. He could face up to 265 years in state prison, Stackow said.

Police do not believe any of Mickle's victims played on his former soccer team.

"This is the kind of guy that I think everyone worries about," Stackow said. "He's trolling the Internet using social-networking sites."

Defense attorney Michael Patrick Parkinson said Mickle decided to plead guilty after reviewing the prosecution's discovery evidence.

"I think that he's doing the right thing by not bringing these people in and having them testify," Parkinson said.

Mickle has been jailed since his arrest on March 29, 2010.