Former Montana teacher gets 10 years for grooming Thai student

A federal judge sentenced a Montana man Wednesday to 10 years in prison for grooming and sexually exploiting a teenage boy while he was teacher in Thailand.

Billie Lee Walker previously admitted in U.S. District Court to the crime of engaging in sexually illicit conduct in a foreign place. Walker spent nearly two decades teaching English, literature and history in Thailand leading up to a father of one of his students discovering explicit communications between the two.

During Walker’s sentencing in the James F. Battin Federal Courthouse in Billings, the prosecution and the defense noted how rarely they see someone charged with sexually illicit conduct in foreign places.

“This may be the only time I’ve charged this statute,” said Assistant U.S. Attorney Zeno Baucus, who asked U.S. District Court Judge Susan P. Watters for a 14-year sentence, arguing that, had Walker committed a similar crime in the U.S., he’d be facing a 10 to 15-year sentence.

Despite the difficulty in prosecuting child sex abuse crimes committed by American citizens oversees, the U.S. has several laws in place granting extraterritorial jurisdiction to federal prosecutors in such cases. Those laws center on child sex trafficking, traveling to a foreign country with the intent of sexually abusing children or, in Walker’s case, grooming a child and coercing them into producing child sex abuse material.

In May 2024, court documents said, a Thai man found inappropriate messages between Walker and his 15-year-old son. Walker had been the boy’s teacher since 2021. The father notified his son’s school about the messages, and Walker left his position, returning to the United States that same month. In an interview with police, the survivor of Walker’s abuse said he had sent the older man a sexually graphic photo of himself in exchange for money. A forensic review of Walker’s phone confirmed the survivor’s account.

When Walker reached the U.S., federal law enforcement interviewed him. Walker, according to court documents, admitted to paying the boy for a nude photo. Walker said he loved the boy and spoke with him at school and via social media, creating fake personas online to interact with the teen. Walker denied physically abusing the boy, but said he had “an interest” in child sex abuse material.

Federal prosecutors indicted Walker in February 2025. He pleaded not guilty to the count of sexually illicit conduct in a foreign place and was released from custody the following month. In between then and his sentencing, he worked at his family’s outfitting business outside of Roundup.

In October 2025, he entered a guilty plea. As part of his plea agreement, Walker waived his right to challenge his sentence.

Baucus said Walker went far beyond just manipulating the teenage boy. Russell Hart, representing Walker, said his client had no documented criminal history until being charged in U.S. District Court. While out of custody leading up to his sentencing, Hart said Walker did not violate any of the conditions of his release, and a psychiatric evaluation concluded that he was at a low risk of reoffending. While he did not think incarceration was necessary for Walker, Hart said, he asked Judge Watters for a sentence of no more than five years.

When given the chance to speak, Walker stood and told Watters that he hoped for empathy as he wanted to be able to care for his elderly parents, both of whom are in their 80s.

“I made a terrible mistake,” said Walker, wearing tinted prescription glasses. “I’m here to take responsibly.

Prior to issuing her sentence, Watters said Walker’s behavior amounted to stalking. Walker created multiple fake accounts on social media in which he posed as people within the modeling industry, Watters said, and ultimately groomed the teen into producing child sex abuse material.

“What stands out to me is the length you went to inject yourself into every aspect of the victim’s life,” she said.

Acknowledging Walker’s lack of criminal history and his low risk to reoffend, Watters opted to order Walker to 10 years in federal prison, four years less than that argued by the prosecution. At the close of the sentencing, a member of the U.S. Marshals Service took Walker into custody.

Last year, the Royal Thai Embassy in Washington, D.C. announced that Thailand had updated the country’s criminal code to impose harsher punishments for child sex abuse, including online grooming and sextortion. A joint report from UNICEF, INTERPOL and Thai authorities found that in 2021, roughly 400,000 Thai children ages 12 to 17 were the victims of online sexual exploitation.

In 2022, according to reporting from Reuters, Thailand’s legislative body made international headlines for legalizing voluntary chemical castration for certain repeat sex offenders deemed at risk to reoffend. The European nations of Germany, Denmark and, most recently, England have enacted similar policies. Montana has had such a law in effect since the 90s, allowing judges to order chemical castration for offenders convicted of a sex offence for the second time.