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NORTON - Police say a bartender from Lynn tried to meet a 13-year-old local girl for sex after writing explicit messages to her over the Internet for several weeks.

Robert C. Walsh III, 31, a bartender at Maddie's Sail Loft in Marblehead, allegedly tried to lure the girl out of her home to engage in sex with her before the girl told her mother, who then went to police, authorities said Friday.

After sending the girl an instant message on June 2, "there were several inappropriate conversations that took place over the next three or four days," Detective Todd Bramwell said during a bail hearing in Attleboro District Court.

Walsh asked the girl for sex and "tried to lure her from her home and tried to meet her in different locations," Bramwell said.

After the mother reported the incidents to police, investigators took over the Internet communication from the girl's computer before obtaining an arrest warrant for Walsh and a search warrant for his home. Walsh, who has a criminal record but without sex crimes, pleaded innocent to enticement of a child under 16, a felony punishable by up to five years in prison.

He was ordered held in jail until Monday, when he was expected to be released on $10,000 cash bail on home confinement with a series of conditions and monitoring with an electronic bracelet.

Judge Robert E. Baylor agreed to release on bail but not before court officials in Lynn can hook up Walsh with the electronic device.

Upon his release, Walsh will be prohibited from using a computer or the Internet. He was also ordered to have no contact with the victim or children younger than 17. He cannot drink alcoholic beverages and must undergo random alcohol tests and random visits from probation officials.

Bramwell, who was the lead investigator on the case, said that when police went to Walsh's home in Lynn, his parents told police he was not home.

Police seized the computers in the home, then found a wire leading from a first-floor window to a garage. Following the wire, they found Walsh in one of two offices in the rear of the garage.

But the defendant's mother, Carolyn Walsh, who was in court with other family members, said that was untrue.

"I never told them he was not home. I told them where he worked. I didn't know if he was home or not. They are lying," she said.

Carolyn Walsh said the arraignment was the first she heard of the allegations against her son.

"He's my son. I love him and I don't know anything more, other than what I heard and you heard," she told a Sun Chronicle reporter. Bramwell alleged that Walsh sent the girl an e-mail photo of himself, and that the girl spoke on the telephone with a man who said he was "Clay." Walsh's middle name is Clay.

The girl did not agree to meet with Walsh, and she did the right thing by telling her mother, Bramwell said.

"Parents should know there are dangers out there and they should be aware of what their children are doing on the Internet," Bramwell said.

The computers seized by police will be examined by experts with the Metropolitan Law Enforcement Council computer crimes unit.

Assisting Bramwell in the investigation were detectives Sgt. Thomas Peterson and Stephen Desfosses. They were assisted by members of the Metropolitan Enforcement Council computer crimes unit and the Bristol County District Attorney's Office.