Holiday Man Accused Of Molesting 7-Year-Old Girl

HOLIDAY, FL – A 62-year-old Holiday man is being held at the Land O’ Lakes Detention Center without bond after being accused of repeatedly molesting a 7-year-old girl.

According to the Pasco County Sheriff’s Office, Joseph Peter Mansfield of 1330 Basswood Drive, Holiday, was charged after the girl’s mother walked in and saw Mansfield touching her daughter inappropriately. According to the mother, Mansfield was sitting in a reclining chair in the TV room and the girl was on her hands and knees in a kneeling position across his lap. The mother reported that Mansfield had his hand under the girl’s dress.

When Pasco deputies questioned Mansfield, he said he touched the victim’s “butt” six or seven times over the past two months when they were playing a game together. The game, Mansfield said, consisted of the girl climbing on his leg and sliding up and down while he grabbed her butt to move her off.

The 7-year-old, however, told deputies that Mansfield touched her “pee-pee” through her clothes several times over the past two weeks.while she was positioned on his lap like a “pony.” She said she tried to stop him once but he moved her hand away.

To maintain the girl’s anonymity, the sheriff’s office declined to reveal Mansfield's relationship to the child.

Mansfield was charged Monday, Feb. 26, with lewd and lascivious fondling. He has never been arrested by Pasco deputies on molestation charges Monday’s arrest. And he is not on the Florida’s registry of sexual predators and offenders.

Image via Pasco Sheriff