A 43-year-old California man, Bernardo Tapia, was arrested by Indiana State Police in Elkhart on last Thursday on charges of child molestation and rape. As FOX59 reported, the charges stem from an incident involving a 12-year-old girl from Greene County, Indiana.
Tapia, a registered sex offender from Santa Clara, California, is accused of meeting the underage girl on the internet and subsequently taking her to a hotel in Bedford for the alleged crimes. The Greene County Sheriff's Office began its investigation after receiving a report last Monday that the girl had gone missing. "The family told deputies that the child had “met an older male subject on the internet, and had made a plan for him to pick her up,” according to FOX59.
Following her return home shortly after the report, investigations revealed that Tapia communicated with the juvenile via the social media platform Snapchat, as stated in an article by The Bloomingtonian. This contact ultimately led to him abducting her from her residence.
In Lawrence County Court, Tapia faces multiple serious charges, including two counts of rape, two counts of child molestation, and two counts of strangulation. Additional charges in Greene County may also arise, depending on the ongoing investigation, according to the Tribune-Star.
The Greene County Sheriff's Office, Detective Shawn Cullison, leads the ongoing investigation, with the collaboration of the Lawrence County Prosecutor's Office and several local law enforcement agencies. Tapia is currently held at the Lawrence County Jail, with a pretrial conference scheduled for December 18 and his jury trial to commence on March 26.
