The preliminary hearing for a Tyrone man accused of raping to juvenile girls in Tyrone Township earlier this month has been continued to Dec. 3.
The hearing for the 22-year-old was originally scheduled for yesterday, but a representative from District Magistrate Fred Miller’s office said the hearing was continued at the request of arresting officer Kevin J. Garhart, PSP-Hollidaysburg and because Magistrate Miller is vacationing this week.
According to an affidavit of probable cause filed with District Magistrate Craig Ormsby in Roaring Springs, the charges stem from an incident that occurred 4/10 of a mile off state Route 453, on Hill Road, in Tyrone Township on Nov. 9.
Police said the evening before, the defendant picked up three juvenile girls in the vicinity of Citizen’s Fire Co. in Tyrone and later purchased beer for the girls. After dropping the youngest of the three girls off at home, the defendant and two victims drove to the Sinking Valley area where they continued to drink alcohol.
According to the affidavit, the three drove to the defendant’s trailer, which is located off SR 453, where the girls relieved themselves and “sat around for awhile.” They then told the man they wanted to go home.
Police said they left the trailer and began driving on Hill Road when the defendant stopped the car and backed onto a side road. Police said he then exited the car and asked which girl was going to partake in sexual relations with him.
Police said both girls declined the proposition, but the man eventually forced vaginal intercourse on both juveniles.
The girls learned of the man’s identity when one of them acquired his wallet from his pants pocket during the assault, according to police.
Police said the girls talked the man into taking them home and fled from him when he stopped to fuel his vehicle in Bellwood.
The next morning, police contacted the man at his residence along SR 1013. The man told police that he picked up the girls after they asked him to purchase cigarettes and beer for them. He said he was only with the girls for less than an hour and never drove further than the Birmingham Bridge on SR 453.
He told police he dropped them off at Mario’s Pizza in Tyrone then went to a friends house, where he stayed until about 4 a.m. He said the girls returned at that time to ask him for a ride to Bellwood.
Later, the defendant was questioned at the state police barracks in Hollidaysburg and told authorities that he had consensual sex with one of the victims.
The defendant is currently lodged in the Blair County Prison in lieu of $80,000 percentage cash bail. He is charged with two counts each of felony rape, sexual assault, indecent assault, aggravated indecent assault, corruption of minors, selling or furnishing alcohol to minor and furnishing cigarettes to a minor.
The representative at Magistrate Miller’s office said the defendant had not yet hired legal counsel.
