With online solicitation cases, Attorney General Greg Abbott has a preference for Williamson County

Attorney General Greg Abbott has made his office’s prosecution of online child predators a centerpiece of his decade-long tenure as the state’s top lawyer, as well as a promotional sound bite in his run for governor this year.

But a detailed review of Abbott’s record in pursuing online solicitation cases — those in which adults try to meet children for sex using the Internet — reveals that pursuit has occurred in an oddly limited way: In recent years, the vast majority of such cases developed and investigated by his office have been brought in Williamson County, a conservative area long viewed as tougher on crime than neighboring jurisdictions.