In a disturbing turn of events, Genesee County officials have charged 32-year-old Brian Scott McCarrick of Bay City with multiple counts of sexual misconduct involving an underage girl. According to WNEM, McCarrick allegedly groomed and assaulted a 13-year-old girl he met while working as a handyman. The Genesee County Sheriff, Chris Swanson, detailed that McCarrick picked up the girl from her Grand Blanc middle school and subsequently assaulted her.
The case came to light after the girl's mother discovered McCarrick fleeing from her daughter's bedroom. Further investigations revealed that McCarrick had been dropping off phones to facilitate their communication and had inserted himself into group chats between the underage victim and her friends, as reported by the ABC12 news article. These alarming activities went unnoticed by parents and educators alike.
The official charges against McCarrick include one count of first-degree criminal sexual conduct and eight counts of third-degree criminal sexual conduct, among others, all of which are felony charges. As per WWJ Newsradio, Sheriff Swanson said, "That’s where grooming starts. They find what they want and then they go after it. Then they start communicating and then they start separating and isolating. Then they show and fill the needs of different individuals, and that’s where we are today."
The grandmother of the Genesee County Sheriff's Department, G.H.O.S.T. (Genesee Human Oppression Strike Team), played a key role in the investigation, tracing the phone left by McCarrick to obtain a search warrant. Sheriff Swanson expressed the gravity of the situation, saying, "As a parent myself, I can’t imagine, when you have your child in your home, and you think it is the safest place, that the predators will still come to your home because that’s what happened in this case." McCarrick, who was arrested as part of a G.H.O.S.T operation, is being held on a $50,000 cash/surety bond and is expected to return to court for a probable cause conference, as per ABC12.
