Bucks County DA: Morrisville handyman arrested as serial child rapist

    William Thomas mushot (photo courtesy of Bucks County District Attorney's Office)

    William Thomas mushot (photo courtesy of Bucks County District Attorney's Office)

    A Morrisville handyman suspected of raping many children over about 40 years collected as many as 1,000 pairs of soiled children’s underwear as “trophy evidence” and documented the serial abuse in sexually explicit writings on the walls of his homes, authorities say.

    William Charles Thomas, 58, also had a play area with hundreds of toys in his mobile home with a sign specifying the rules of the room required all children to be nude, police said. More than a thousand photographs and drawings of prepubescent children wallpapered his bedroom, and police found as many as 100 dolls that Thomas allegedly turned into sex toys, according to an affidavit.

    Police even discovered that the background photo on Thomas’ cellphone was a naked, prepubescent girl, police said.

    “The human race hasn’t come up with words to describe what we saw in that trailer,” Falls Lt. Henry Ward said. “It was horrific.”

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    Falls Township police charged Thomas with rape, child pornography, corruption of minors and multiple sex and assault offenses for abuse authorities suspect dates back to the 1970s, Bucks County District Attorney Matt Weintraub said.

    Police have identified five victims, but fear there could be many more because Thomas has changed jobs and homes several times in the past four decades. They asked anyone who interacted with him and suspects abuse to contact Falls Sgt. Christopher Clark at (215) 302-3315 or clarkpd@fallstwp.com or Bucks County Det. Lt. Robert Gorman at (215) 340-8141 or rmgorman@buckscounty.org.

    “This is a real life boogeyman. This is every parent’s worst nightmare,” Weintraub said.

    Police discovered Thomas’ alleged abuse when the manager of the Midway Village Trailer Park on Bristol Pike, where Thomas lives and works as handyman, alerted officers to a piece of plywood – uncovered in a mobile home where Thomas had done work – that was covered in explicit writing detailing the sexual abuse of two girls, ages 3 and 7, according to an affidavit.

    Police got a search warrant and found so much child pornography and other evidence of sexual abuse inside Thomas’ home that they couldn’t process it all in one day, police said. Investigators also found drug paraphernalia associated with marijuana and methamphetamine use in his home, according to the affidavit.

    Thomas confessed some of his alleged crimes, police said. A preliminary hearing has been set for Feb. 15.

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