At least six Scott County kids are victims of child abuse, child neglect or child pornography that happened at one Davenport home, according to the Scott County Sheriff's Office.
The Scott County Sheriff’s Office says for now at least three people have been arrested in the case, but more arrests will likely be made soon.
In January, the Scott County Sheriff’s Office started looking into allegations of child abuse, child pornography, and child neglect at a mobile home at 4847 West Kimberly Road in Davenport.
According to information in a Criminal Complaint filed with the United States District Court Southern District of Iowa, in August of 2011 a parent from Davenport reported that he had information concerning possible sexual abuse of his children who resided in Brown’s trailer park, which is now known as Patriot Mobile Home Park. The complaint states the three children were 2, 4, and 6 years old and the parent identified James Faler and Melvin Lucier as the possible perpetrators. Lucier currently lives at the Patriot Mobile Home Park and Faler previously lived with him, according to the Scott County Sheriff's Office.
The complaint states, the Davenport Police Department and the Iowa Department of Human Services started an investigation and the investigation expanded to other children and other suspects.
According to the complaint, on May 31, 2013, Faler was arrested by police in Louisville, Kentucky. During the arrest, officers found that Faler had a backpack that contained printed images described as child pornography. The backpack also contained a laptop and a thumb drive. The thumb drive contained images including videos of children being sexually abused by Faler, according to the complaint.
Data determined the images were taken with a cellphone at Faler’s trailer in Davenport. The minors found in the files were identified and all resided in Davenport at the time the images were created, according to the complaint.
Faler is now being held at the Louisville Kentucky Metro Department of Corrections.
According to arrest affidavits, filed in the Iowa District Court for Scott County, Melvin Lucier was charged with sexual abuse 2nd, preventing apprehension, obstructing prosecution and two counts of sex offender registration violation.
The affidavit filed March 28, 2014 states multiple police and Department of Human Services reports were taken between 2011 and 2012 of a 4-year-old girl that reported that she was being sexually abused by Lucier.
An affidavit from April 7, 2014, states a five-year-old girl reported to the Department of Human Services that she was sexually assaulted by Lucier.
Lucier admitted in June 2013, he destroyed physical evidence, according to the affidavit.
A mom has also been charged in the case with child endangerment. According to the affidavit, Jessica Epping allowed her six-year-old son to be supervised by a registered sex offender, identified as James Faler.
“Parents knew these people were sex offenders but still allowed their children to go visit them and spend the night with them,” said Schmidt.
Records show the child has not disclosed an assault at this time as others his age have.
The mobile home park Lucier lives and Faler previously lived is home to eight registered sex offenders.
“We all know out here actually, that there's pedophiles out here,” said one mom who wanted to remain anonymous.
By law, certain sex offenders have to live at least 2,000 feet away from schools and registered day cares.
“A lot of the areas except for little pockets, are out of bounds for them to live in,” said Lieutenant Bryce Schmidt with the Scott County Sheriff’s Office.
One place they can live is the Patriot Mobile Home Park and Apartments in Davenport.
“There are registered offenders in that park that we have no trouble with,” said Schmidt.
Schmidt says they hope to have the investigation wrapped up in the next few weeks.