An Easton Police sergeant was convicted on two separate counts of misconduct in office for engaging in sexual contact with two different teenagers while on duty, Maryland State Prosecutor Charlton T. Howard III announced Wednesday.

Easton Police Department Sgt. Jason Dyott, 38, has served with the department since 2008, according to charging documents. The officer was charged in April with allegedly using his department-issued cellphone to communicate in a “sexual manner” through Snapchat with teenagers and students at Talbot County high schools and engaging in physical sexual acts with two teens while on duty, according to charging documents.

“Law enforcement officers who abuse the power of their position, and betray the trust of the community, must be held accountable,” Howard said in a news release.

In November 2022, Dyott began communicating with a Talbot County high school student, and in the following months “leveraged his position as a police officer in order to engage in a sexual relationship,” the charging document read. He sent the teen sexually provocative and explicit images, and they had sex twice.

While on duty, the officer met the teen in a Target parking lot in Easton and the two made out in his patrol vehicle, according to the charging document. After learning that the Talbot County Sheriff’s Office was investigating his sexual contact with students, the officer searched phrases like, “legal consent sex age in md” and “explicit pics sent law in md” on his personal cellphone, among other searches for teen sexting laws and a statutory rape lawyer in the state.

The officer began communicating with a second teen who had graduated from a Talbot County high school in 2022 around November of that same year, according to the charging document. He was on duty Nov. 11, 2022, when he texted the teen to get her from a friend’s house, picking her up that evening in his patrol car and having sex in the vehicle.

“The Easton Police Department is thankful for the diligence and professionalism of the Office of the State Prosecutor during the investigation and criminal prosecution of Mr. Dyott,” Chief of Police Alan Lowrey wrote in a release. “We are grateful for the careful consideration the court gave to deciding this case and finding that Mr. Dyott’s actions constituted misconduct in office.”

The police department will seek to issue the appropriate administrative penalties to Dyott, Lowrey said in the release.

After a trial in Circuit Court for Talbot County, the officer was found guilty on both counts of misconduct. He awaits sentencing Nov. 1.

SBWD Law, the office of Dyott’s lawyer, Shaun Frederick Owens, declined to comment.