By Angeljean Chiaramida
Staff writer
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SALEM — Two men — 19-year-old Scott Deschenes of Salisbury and 30-year-old Tyrone Farrar of Lawrence — were indicted Friday by an Essex County Grand Jury after being charged this summer by Salisbury police in two separate incidents of statutory rape of a child.
Deschenes, of 118 Atlantic Ave., was indicted on one charge of rape of a child and one charge of child enticement, according to Stephen O'Connell, spokesman for the office of District Attorney Jonathan Blodgett.
Deschenes was arraigned on July 19 at Newburyport District Court, charged with felony statutory child rape after an investigation that began in mid-February. The victim's mother alerted police to what she perceived as a potential crime after reading e-mails allegedly sent to her 13-year-old child from Deschenes.
According to police report by Salisbury Detective Mark Thomas presented in court documents, the investigation indicated that Deschenes had allegedly been trying to entice his victim into posing for adult child pornography websites for money. The rape of a child charge came after police learned from the victim of physical contact that eventually occurred with Deschenes, as the older youth pursued a friendship with the victim, according to the report.
Instead of standing for a dangerousness hearing requested by county prosecutors, a week after Deschenes' arraignment, his attorney agreed to comply with the prosecutor's request to hold him without bail behind bars on behalf of public safety.
Alarmed by the case, Thomas reached out to the press to alert area parents to the potential hazards children face on the Internet. Calling the Internet the No. 1 threat to children today, Thomas praise the mother of the victim for her diligence in keeping track of her child's online communications.
Salisbury police worked with members of the Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force for Massachusetts and its commander, Sgt. Steven Del Negro, on the case.
Farrar, a security guard at Lawrence's Frost Elementary School, was indicted on three charges of aggravated rape of a child and one charge of driving while under the influence of drugs, O'Connell said. Two of the aggravated child rape charges were brought by Salisbury police for incidents believed to have taken place in Salisbury, and the third comes from an alleged Lawrence incident, he said.
The driving charge was brought by Salisbury police, after they stopped Farrar early on the morning of Aug. 1 for erratic driving. The stop by officers James Sullivan and James Pollard brought an immediate investigation as to why Farrar was in a car at 1 in the morning with a 14-year-old girl to whom he was not related.
The child's mother said Farrar was her daughter's basketball coach and that she'd been concerned about what she considered his inappropriate relationship with her daughter for months.
When Thomas interviewed the victim, he learned a sexual relationship had been going on between the Farrar and the girl for a year, with sexual activity between the two taking place in both Salisbury and Lawrence, according to police.
The victim said Farrar was her basketball coach and mentor at Lawrence's Frost School. She said Farrar would pick her up several blocks from her house in Lawrence and take her to other locations to have sex, including the Knotty Pine Motel and his Atlantic Avenue beach house in Salisbury and in the back of his van.
Farrar also gave Salisbury police a written statement confirming he had sexual relations with the girl approximately six times.
O'Connell expected both defendants would be arraigned sometime this month in Salem Superior Court on the charges. Both cases are being prosecuted by Essex Assistant District Attorney Kate MacDougall.
