Former registered sex offender faces new child-rape charges in Bradenton

BRADENTON -- A former registered sexual offender faces new charges he raped three children, ages 5, 10 and 11.

Gary Adam Meeks, 34, is charged with one count of capital sexual battery but, in court Thursday afternoon, a prosecutor indicated he will face additional charges after two more victims stepped forward with similar allegations.

All three children are known to Meeks.

Meeks appeared in court via video conference Thursday afternoon for a first-appearance hearing before Circuit Judge Susan Maulucci. She ordered him held without bond at the Manatee County jail.

Meeks is charged with sexually abusing a 5-year-old girl who was known to him. The disclosure was made by the girl when a Manatee County Sheriff's Office child protective investigator and a deputy went to her home to conduct an interview in an unrelated case, according to the probable cause affidavit.

When the girl told them Meeks would touch her private parts whenever he wanted, the investigation was immediately stopped

and a forensic interview done at the Child Protective Investigative Division Office.

The girl told investigators Meeks attacked her at least three times, according to the report. He would threaten to spank her if she told anyone about what had happened.

Meeks was brought in for an interview but denied the allegations, the report stated. He told investigators he may have accidently touched the victim while he was changing or cleaning her.

The investigator also wrote in the report Meeks would repeatedly ask if he would go to jail if he explained what had happened.

Assistant State Attorney Cynthia Evers told Maulucci the 5-year-old girl's siblings, ages 10 and 11, had since come forward to make similar allegations.

Evers also detailed what she called Meek's extensive criminal history, beginning when he was a juvenile.

In 2013, Evers said Meeks was inexplicably allowed to withdraw a previous plea of no contest to a charge of false imprisonment from 2003. As a result of that case, he had registered as a sex offender. The victims in that case had been a 3-year-old boy and a 5-year-old girl.

The charges at the time of his arrest in that case involved sexual battery and lewd and lascivious molestation, according to court records. Formal charges were amended more than once and eventually reduced to false imprisonment.

The vacated plea was a part of an agreement Meeks entered, Evers said, where he agreed to testify against his co-defendant, his girlfriend at that time, who had taken part in the sexual battery.

Meeks' criminal history also includes charges of burglary, arson, multiple violations of probation, felony battery, domestic battery and fraud.

"Every time he was released from custody, he committed a new offense," Evers said.

Jessica De Leon, Herald law enforcement reporter, can be reached at 951-745-7049. You can follow her on Twitter @JDeLeon1012.

This story was originally published March 17, 2016 at 11:35 PM with the headline "Former registered sex offender faces new child-rape charges in Bradenton ."