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Reports of a disturbing case of sexual assault coming from Belleville.

A 45-year-old man is in custody after allegedly raping a 2-year-old girl. Officers say there was a witness present for the assault. The suspect in the case is a relative of the child. The toddler has been taken to a hospital for evaluation.

The case is now in the hands of the State's Attorney.

 

The St. Peters Police need help to find a man who exposed himself to a teenage girl Tuesday.

The victim told police she was in the parking lot of Spencer Creek library when the man called her over to the car, asking if she needed a ride home. When the girl approached the car, she told police she was the man was naked.

The suspect is described as a white man with a goatee, dark hair, and an Irish flag tattoo on his upper right arm. The suspect was last seen driving a green Nissan Xterra with the partial license plate AE9.

Anyone with information is asked to call the St. Peters Police.

 

LAKE ST. LOUIS, Mo. (AP) - A former St. Louis-area teacher is facing charges accusing him of sexually assaulting a 10-year-old student.

Prosecutors say 34-year-old Joseph Thomas Maddock of Lake St. Louis is charged with statutory sodomy.

He is jailed on $50,000 cash-only bond.

Authorities say Maddock, a former teacher at Andrews Academy, convinced the parents of the victim to allow him to home-school him.

Maddock has taught at 10 schools in the St. Louis metropolitan area since 2001. Anyone with additional information about the suspect is urged to contact Lake St. Louis police.

 

Prosecutors say a St. Louis County man recruited three teenagers to become prostitutes.

Anton Morris faces multiple charges, including sexual trafficing of a child. Morris allegedly convinced three girls, aged 16, 17, and 19, to start working for him as a prostitutes. Authorities say he set the first girl with a hotel room and started offering her services as a prostitute on April 15.

Morris now sits in jail on a $100,000 bond.

 

St. Louis Public School officials have placed a high school teacher on leave after he allegedly had sex with a student.

Court documents say David Marler had sex with a male student at Soldan High School. Marler also allegedly gave the same student an inhalant that made him dizzy and lightheaded. Marler faces eleven charges, including sodomy, sexual contact with a student, and endangering the welfare of a child.

The school placed Marler on leave on Monday.

St. Louis Police are asking any parents who believe their kids may have been victimized by Marler to call the Child Abuse unit at 314.444.5385.

 

CLAYTON, Mo. (AP) — James Frost is already serving 40 years in prison for four St. Louis-area rapes. Now, he is getting more prison time for a fifth.

The St. Louis Post-Dispatch reports that all the crimes occurred in 2006 in St. Louis city and county. The fifth case was brought by prosecutors in September on the basis of further DNA testing. Prosecutors say Frost assaulted the victim at gunpoint.

As part of a plea deal, Frost on Monday was sentenced to 30 years plus 10 on charges of forced rape, forced sodomy and sexual abuse. The latest sentence will run concurrently with the time already being served on the other attacks.

A former Boy Scout troop volunteer will be sentenced in May after being convicted of a dozen counts of sexual abuse involving a teenage boy.

St. Clair County jurors Thursday convicted 55 year old John Demers after less than two hours of deliberation.

The charges involved a teenager who said Demers had inappropriate contact with him between 2005 and 2011.

Demer's attorney says his client maintains his innocence.

The Edwardsville man convicted of molesting two young relatives in 2008, will spend the rest of his natural life in prison.

Michael Burgund of Edwardsville told turned himself into police and said he assaulted the girls, aged two and three in 2011, but later withdrew that confession. This was the mandatory minimum penalty based on the number and types of charges Burgund faced.

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (AP) - A former Jefferson City middle and high school band teacher has been sentenced to 60 days in jail for having sexual contact with a student.

The Jefferson City News-Tribune reports that Christopher Knehans's attorney argued for a 30-day sentence Wednesday. But Judge Dan Green Wednesday ordered the maximum 60 days allowed by the plea agreement, beginning immediately.

The 39-year-old pleaded guilty in September to two counts of sexual contact with a student.

Under the sentence, Knehans will serve serve three years supervised probation after he is released from the jail. He also will be required to register as a sex offender.

The indictment said he inappropriately touched a 17-year-old student in September 2011.

BELLEVILLE, Ill. (AP) - A Roman Catholic priest whose decades-old molestation of a former altar boy led to a $6.3 million payout in an Illinois lawsuit has been kicked out of the priesthood by Pope Benedict XVI.

Diocese of Belleville Bishop Edward Braxton announced the move involving 78-year-old Raymond Kownacki in a statement published in a recent edition of the diocesan newspaper, The Messenger. Braxton says the papal decree calls the defrocking "for the good of the church."

Kownacki is living in a St. Louis-area nursing home and has refused media requests for interviews. He has not been charged criminally.

Kownacki's misdeeds resulted in a $5 million jury award against the diocese to James Wisniewski in 2008. That payout grew to $6.3 million to reflect interest that accrued while the diocese appealed.