The trial of a man wanted for abducting and molesting a girl in Jackson County more than 18 years ago has been continued for more than five months after a judge approved his motion for a continuance Tuesday.
Charley Hollin, 61, of Salem, Oregon, had been set to stand trial at 8:30 a.m. Aug. 22 in Jackson Circuit Court. After granting the motion, Jackson Circuit Court Judge Richard W. Poynter set Hollin’s jury trial for 8:30 a.m. Feb. 6.
Hollin was arrested and charged in January in connection with the 1999 incident. The arrest occurred at the place he had worked for the past 15 years.
Hollin initially was held in federal custody on a charge of unlawful flight to avoid prosecution and identity theft, charges that have since been dropped, said Tim Horty, a spokesman with the U.S. District Attorney, Southern District of Indiana, in Indianapolis.
The federal charges initially were filed against Hollin to help get him back to Jackson County to stand trial on local charges, Horty said Tuesday.
The local charges Hollin faces are three Class A felony counts of child molesting and two Class B felony counts of criminal confinement. A Class A felony is punishable by 20 to 50 years in prison if convicted.
During a pretrial conference Tuesday in Jackson Circuit Court, Hollin’s attorney, John Goodridge of Evansville, submitted the motion to continue the trial.
The local charges stem from an incident in January 1999 involving the abduction of a 10-year-old girl at knifepoint from outside Girls Inc. on West Second Street in Seymour. The girl was taken to a secluded area, molested and released naked on a country road near Cortland. Her abductor threw her clothing out of the vehicle before she was found and rescued by a passing motorist.
Investigators said Hollin was identified as a suspect from evidence collected at the scene, including a coat and a day planner that belonged to him and DNA evidence in the car. The car also had been recovered as evidence.
He initially was charged in 2000 by the Jackson County Prosecutor’s Office but then disappeared before police could arrest him.
At the time of his arrest in January, U.S. District Attorney Josh Minkler said Hollin had first fled to Minnesota and later to Oregon.
Minkler said Hollin had been arrested living under the name of Andrew David Hall, an 8-year-old boy who died in a car accident in Kentucky in 1975.
The FBI identified Hollin used facial recognition technology comparing an older photo of him to Hollin’s passport renewal application as Hall, Minkler said.