Pawhuska man charged with child molestation after turning himself in
BY LOUISE RED CORN World Correspondent
Friday, March 15, 2013
3/15/13 at 10:26 AM
PAWHUSKA - A Pawhuska man was charged with child molestation after walking into the police station earlier this month and confessing to having sexual contact with 15 to 20 children across the country, including at least one in Pawhuska, a police affidavit says.
Jack R. "Rusty" Cheshewalla II, 62, is charged with two counts of child molestation.
First Assistant District Attorney Mike Fisher said the investigation is continuing.
"It could very well expand not only as to this victim but as to other victims," he said.
On March 1, Pawhuska Police Officer William McDaniel was at the police station when Cheshewalla walked in at 7:09 p.m.
"I'm here to turn myself in," he said, according to a probable cause affidavit.
McDaniel asked for details, and Cheshewalla told McDaniel that he had decided to come forward because he thought he had contracted a sexually transmitted disease from a woman and was frightened that he might have passed it on to a 7- or 8-year-old girl, the officer wrote in the affidavit.
Cheshewalla told McDaniel that the guilt was "eating him up," according to the affidavit, which was filed March 6 in Osage County District Court.
Cheshewalla is in the Osage County Jail with bail set at $300,000.
"I'd probably still be out there doing this if I wouldn't have caught this STD," McDaniel's affidavit quotes Cheshewalla as saying.
"I figured I should come in tonight because tomorrow is Saturday and the kids will be out of school on Saturday so I should go to jail tonight."
Cheshewalla, who has no criminal record beyond a few alcohol-related misdemeanors more than six years ago, told McDaniel that he has molested 15 to 20 children over the years but couldn't remember the details because he has lived all over the United States.
AutoTrak, a computerized database of public records, shows that Cheshewalla - a retired Marine who served two tours in Vietnam and often appeared with the Pawhuska American Legion Post's color guard - has spent the past 12 years in Pawhuska but previously had addresses in Tulsa; Tahlequah; Somerset, Ky.; Des Plaines, Ill.; and Billings, Mont.
Cheshewalla told police he had sexual contact with a Pawhuska girl who was 7 or 8 on Feb. 28, a few days earlier and another time earlier, on an unknown date, the affidavit says.
He also said he had inappropriate contact with other children in Pawhuska, according to the affidavit.
Original Print Headline: Man charged with child molestation
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Jack R. "Rusty" Cheshewalla II: He decided to come forward because he thought he had contracted a sexually transmitted disease from a woman and was frightened that he might have passed it on to a 7- or 8-year-old girl in Pawhuska, an officer's affidavit states. "I'd probably still be out there doing this if I wouldn't have caught this STD," he said
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