South Jordan nurse practitioner arrested, allegedly messaged undercover officer about sexually abusing children

SOUTH JORDAN, Utah (ABC4) — A man police say was working as a nurse practitioner has been arrested for messaging an undercover officer about sexually abusing an 8-year-old child.

Joel Covington, 46, of South Jordan, was arrested for enticing a minor with first-degree felony sexual activity. He has not been formally charged yet.

According to the arrest statement, a sheriff’s deputy with the Utah County Sheriff’s Office went undercover on a social media and dating app and posed as an adult man, pretending to have two young children.

A man, later identified as Covington, allegedly made contact with the undercover officer’s account. The app showed that he was within 57 miles and was 46 years old. In the messages, Covington made references to one of the two young children, saying he was “sexually interested.”

Covington asked the undercover officer about meeting with him and his 8-year-old son, documents say. He allegedly made various comments about sexually abusing the child in different ways, and asked for pictures and videos.

During the conversations, Covington mentioned that he was a nurse practitioner. The sheriff’s deputy was able to identify Covington as a Psychiatric Mental Health Nurse Practitioner working in Lehi.

“Because of his position of trust, I made the determination not to wait for the meeting that Joel [Covington] wanted to arrange and, for the safety of others, went to his place of employment where he was arrested in the parking lot,” the arresting sheriff’s deputy wrote in his statement.

When Covington was arrested in the parking lot of his workplace, he allegedly admitted to law enforcement that he had the conversations, but “was not going to go through with” sexually abusing the child.

During an interview with the sheriff’s deputy, Covington said that he has had similar conversations multiple times over the last 10 years and had even received child sexual abuse material that he had since deleted. Covington claimed that it was “all online,” despite suggesting multiple meeting times and locations.

The 46-year-old said that the most he would have done was “met with the dad and not gone through with” sexually abusing the child, according to the arrest statement. He also allegedly stated that this was a “relapse,” and he had not had conversations like that in years.

Covington was arrested and booked into the Utah County Jail, where he is being held without bail.