On Monday, former Tyrone School District police chief Mark Frailey was arrested for violating a protection from abuse order for allegedly calling the 17-year-old victim in a sexual misconduct case.
Yesterday, the 39-year-old Spruce Creek man was incarcerated at the Huntingdon County Jail for doing the same thing.
Huntingdon County Judge Stewart Kurtz issued a protection from abuse order on Sept. 17 which prohibited Frailey from contacting the girl; but according to state police, Frailey violated the order on Dec. 31 when he phoned the girl.
Yesterday, Frailey was arrested again, this time charged with indirect criminal contempt for violating the order, after phoning the girl for a second time. He was also arraigned on new charges relating to the initial police complaint.
District Magistrate Daniel Davis of Alexandria, who arraigned Frailey in each of the first two cases, said he did not handle this most recent case, but did say that he was aware there were new charges.
Frailey was arraigned before District Justice Richard Wilt of Huntingdon last evening. Wilt said this morning that in addition to an indirect criminal contempt charge, another criminal complaint was filed.
A hearing for his first violation is scheduled for next week before Kurtz.
Frailey’s troubles began in June when state police opened an investigation after the juvenile’s mother contacted police regarding the situation. She told police that while Frailey was employed as the police chief of the Tyrone Area School District and as the supervisor of a school-based club known as the Police Explorers, he began a relationship with her daughter which eventually turned physical.
According to an affidavit of probable cause, the mother said Frailey began driving her daughter home after different school activities and also began placing phone calls to their residence.
She said she asked Frailey to stop these actions, but he continued to do so.
She also told police, according to the affidavit, that Frailey once picked her daughter up at 5:30 a.m. on a school day for a “school-related breakfast.” She later learned there was no such breakfast being held in the district.
The girl, who was 16 at the time of the incident and is now 17-years-old, told police that she met Frailey at a spot along state Route 453 just past Grier School in mid to late May, and there, she and Frailey kissed. She said it happened again on June 12, but this time, noted there was also inappropriate touching.
Police interviewed Frailey on June 18 and he denied the allegations, but later said the only thing that happened between him and the girl occurred with her consent after she turned 16 years of age.
On June 25, the girl told police she had sexual relations with Frailey on three separate occasions, all at his home.
According to the affidavit of probable cause, Frailey admitted the sexual encounter by stating to a Tyrone resident that he made a mistake and had sexual relations with a 16-year-old girl and that he wasn’t worried because police could only arrest him for corruption of minors because he waited for the girl to turn 16 years of age. Frailey also told the man that he stored all his personal files and records in his garage.
On Aug. 11, Brown served a search warrant on the computer system of the Tyrone Area School District and recovered a box of e-mails directed from Frailey to the girl. Brown also said he served a second warrant on a garage at a property located on West 17th Street in Tyrone and found newspaper clippings, two VCR tapes, a letter from an attorney an official police book and a folder titled “personal.”
Seven days later, Brown, with permission from the victim’s mother, analyzed the family’s personal computer. There, two instant message screen names were found.
The last search warrant was served in October. At Frailey’s home, a 2003 date book was found, eight floppy disks, a certificate issued to the victim, a birthday card, a printed e-mail message, four pages of written notes, seven compact discs and a photo display of the victim.
Bail for Frailey was previously set at $25,000. A preliminary hearing on the initial charges was scheduled for late December, but was continued at the request of the defendant, who is represented by Altoona attorney Theodore Krol. The hearing is now scheduled for Jan. 28.
