Randolph County arrests man charged with 20 child sex crimes

Randolph County Prosecutor Mike Fusselman filed a warrant Monday to arrest 45-year-old Alonzo Thorpe for numerous child sex crimes. Police confirmed Thorpe turned himself in Tuesday night.

Fusselman charged Thorpe with 20 crimes, including several counts of statutory sodomy, child molestation and enticement of a child. Online court records list addresses for Thorpe in the Columbia, Moberly and Clark areas. He will be held in the Randolph County Jail on a $100,000 cash bond.

Moberly police’s probable cause statement, dated November 2014, said the department received a call from the state’s Department of Children’s Services abuse hotline about a 12-year-old claiming sexual abuse from Thorpe. Police interviewed the child, along with the child’s sibling, about numerous instances of sexual abuse from 2011 to 2014. Thorpe knew the children for a year before the alleged abuse began at various places in Moberly.

“Thorpe told [the child] if [the child] told on him, [the child] would get into trouble, and [the child] would go to jail,” the statement says.

Fusselman could not say why he filed charges nearly 10 months after receiving Moberly police’s probable cause statement, because it would reveal specific pieces of evidence sensitive in the case. However, he said the reasons would come out in the course of Thorpe’s judicial proceedings.

Moberly Police Department Major Kenna Neese told ABC 17 News any call to the state’s hotline eventually makes it to the police department for investigation. She said victims of sexual abuse often show signs of it through fear of seeing or being around specific people.

The Missouri Child Abuse and Neglect Hotline is staffed all hours, every day by Children’s Service workers. Their number is 1-800-392-3738.