TAMPA, Fla. — Detectives from the Dade City Police Department arrested a 49-year-old Dade City man on Wednesday on multiple counts of Capital Sexual Battery and related sex offenses.
Dade City detectives, assisted by the TIA Police Department, arrested Phillips Edgardo Mendez as he stepped off a plane at Tampa International Airport following a trip to Puerto Rico.
The allegations reportedly involve sexual assaults on two different children under the age of 12, over a three-year period — most recently in February of this year.
Mendez, of Dade City, was arrested on a warrant and charged with 11 counts of capital felony sexual battery and 3 counts of lewd and lascivious molestation, each a life felony. Mendez was booked into the Orient Road Jail under a $700,000 bond.
Police say that the incidents came to light on or about February 18, when the older of the two youths (now 10 years old) reported the assaults to their mother, who called the police. Subsequent investigation and examinations led to the charges.
The identities of the children and the locations where the incidents took place are being withheld by police due to the nature of the allegations.
