MURRELLS INLET, SC (WBTW) – Horry County police say they have arrested one man after allegations of criminal sexual conduct with a minor.
Booking records from J Reuben Long show 51-year-old Paul Gene Mitchell from Surfside Beach was arrested Monday and charged with criminal sexual conduct third degree, criminal sexual conduct with a minor under 16 second degree and criminal sexual conduct with a minor 11-14 years of age second degree.
The incident report from Horry County police says officers responded to St. James High School on Nov. 30 to take a statement from a victim about an incident that happened about 5 years ago.
According to the report, the victim told police she was sexually assaulted when she was 13 and the abuse went on for more than six months.
The report says the victim was initially sexually abused by another person, but Mitchell allegedly knew about the abuse and after witnessing several incidents of abuse, he also joined in. The victim says on several occasions, the suspects tried to get her under the influence of drugs or alcohol to make her less willing to resist sexual contact.
The victim also told police she knew of another person who had been a victim of this type of behavior from the two suspects. The police report says officers met with the second victim Dec. 2 who arrived with a partially written statement that described the encounter she had with Mitchell.
The second victim told police she was 15 when she went out on the back porch with Mitchell when he began to talk about “how horny he was and that he couldn’t find someone to give him a “hand job” or a “blowjob” and that he had even gone around the neighborhood and asked women to do it”. The report also describes an incident when the girl went with Mitchell to the gas station and he bought her m&ms then pulled into a parking lot and exposed himself to her. Though the police report was heavily redacted, victim two told police “this occurred several more times over several months.”
Booking records show that Mitchell is currently being held at the J Reuben Long Detention Center under a $110,000 bond.