MANATEE — A traffic stop in Indiana led to the capture of a Manatee man authorities here say raped a teen girl and molested two others after giving them alcohol and drugs.
In one of the cases, Derrick Faircloth, 39, took sexually explicit pictures of a 17-year-old victim, according to authorities.
Faircloth is being held in an Indiana jail awaiting extradition to Manatee County, where he faces 49 counts of possession of child pornography. Investigators found the images on his computer after the girls came forward to report him, according to sheriff’s officials.
Investigators are relieved that Faircloth has been caught.
“We were very concerned. He took steps to set up these victims, which makes him a very dangerous person,” sheriff’s spokesman Dave Bristow said.
Once back in Manatee, Faircloth also will face numerous charges stemming from the teens’ allegations in July, for which he was arrested but later released on bond.
In July, detectives arrested Faircloth after the girls, ages 14, 16 and 17, said he gave them alcohol, and gave one of the girls a Xanax pill.
The victims said Faircloth was known to have parties at his house where alcohol was served, and they knew his 20-year-old son. The first victim to come forward, the 16-year-old, said Faircloth took her into a room and raped her after she drank a lot of alcohol at one of the parties.
She later told detectives she never would have allowed Faircloth to do what he did if she had not had the alcohol, sheriff’s reports said.
Two other girls, ages 14 and 17, came forward saying Faircloth molested them at parties while they were drunk, and also showed them pornography.
After the allegations, detectives arrested Faircloth on charges of sexual battery, two counts of lewd and lascivious molestation, three counts of introduction of obscene material to a minor, three counts of contributing to the delinquency of a minor and delivery of a controlled substance to a minor.
Detectives also seized his computer, which was later found to have dozens of sexually explicit pictures of one of his victims, according to Bristow.
Warrants for possession of child pornography were obtained in late October, but deputies could not find Faircloth.
On Thursday, a Wayne County, Ind., police officer pulled Faircloth over for a routine traffic violation while he was driving on Interstate 70, according to a news report from the Palladium-Item newspaper. A computer check showed the child porn warrants.
Indiana police also found an 18-year-old woman in the car, believed to be the victim shown in the images of child pornography that when she was 17, Bristow said. She was not taken into custody, and detectives in Manatee want to interview her upon her return, he said.
Faircloth is being held in jail in Indiana without bond until he is brought back to Manatee, according to Bristow.
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