The body of Thomas Haskins was a day away from being cremated – and his closest kin didn’t even know he was dead.A Columbia City man was behind bars Wednesday, accused of fondling a 3-year-old Claypool girl.
The Kosciusko County Sheriff’s Department said Zachery Robert Roderick Walsh, 20, admitted touching the girl.
Deputies were called to the Claypool home about 11:30 p.m. Monday. When they arrived, the girl’s mother said Walsh is the brother of a family friend and was asked to take care of her two young girls while the two women went shopping.
The mother told police that her daughter had been touched inappropriately while they were gone, and the sheriff’s department said the 3-year-old described a fondling act to police and said that it happened in a bedroom without her sister present.
Deputies took Walsh to the Kosciusko County Sheriff’s Department where he was interviewed. The department said he confessed. Walsh was arrested and preliminarily charged with child molesting, fondling or touching a child under the age of 14.
He was being held in the Kosciusko County Jail on $100,000 bond.
