Police officers found a runaway teenager and arrested a truck driver charged with sexual assault of a child last week at a truck stop off of Interstate 40 in east Amarillo.
An officer was dispatched May 30 to the Petro Truck Stop, 8500 E. I-40, in an effort to locate a teenage female reported as a runaway from California, the Amarillo Police Department said.
A private investigator had located a truck driver, Rosario Emanuel Joseph Licitra, 23, of Florida, who the investigator believed knew the girl’s whereabouts and may have transported her out of California, police said.
http://liarcatchers.com/pedophile_tracking.html
The investigator had information that the driver had last had been in contact with the juvenile about a week earlier and that she had not been in contact with her family since then, police said.
When the responding officer drove into the Petro parking lot a man approached him and identified himself as Licitra. He told officers he wanted to cooperate in the investigation but did not have anything to do with the missing girl, police said.
Officers searched the man’s truck, but didn’t find anything to indicate the girl had been with the man, police said.
Officers then contacted a law enforcement agency in California and obtained a photograph of the missing girl. Officers continued their investigation, suspicious that the driver had more information than what was initially provided, police said. They contacted an APD detective, who joined officers at the scene.
Officers took the photograph of the girl into the truck stop and located witnesses who had seen the teenager. While officers continued to search for her, the police department received a call from the girl, who was at a nearby truck stop, police said. Officers located her and took her into custody.
The officers’ investigation indicated that the girl left voluntarily with the man. The detective continued to investigate and developed information that the man had sexual contact with the juvenile while in Amarillo, police said.
Licitra was arrested and booked into the Potter County Detention Center for indecency with a child and sexual assault of a child.
On Wednesday, the 47th District Attorney’s Office formally charged Licitra with indecency with a child by sexual contact and sexual assault of a child, police said.
At the time of the report, officers were making arrangements to return the runaway teen to California, police said.
There is evidence that the suspect and juvenile met online through social media some time before the incident, and had exchanged information by text messages before she left California, police said.
