Police in Florida have found a missing 17-year-old girl after searching the house of a known sex-offender. The man whose house the teen was found in, Alexis Diaz-Toledo, was convicted of lewd and lascivious battery involving a minor in 2014.
According to an article from Fox News, Polk County detectives paid Diaz-Toledo a visit after receiving a tip that a runaway teenage girl might be staying with a man in Dundee. At first, the 30-year-old man told the officers that he had not seen the girl for several days and denied having any knowledge of her whereabouts. He also allegedly refused to let the police search his home at first.
Detectives would later return to Diaz-Toledo’s home after determining that he was in violation of his sex offender registration requirements due to him failing to report that he had two vehicles kept at his home. Investigators then searched the home for the runaway girl and eventually found her hiding in a bedroom closet.
The girl was taken in by police and safely returned home to her family according to the Sheriff’s Office. However, there was no explanation as to how she ended up at the sex-offender’s house to begin with.
Back to jail for Alexis Diaz-Toledo
Naturally there was a great deal of concern that Diaz-Toledo, a 30-year-old man, had a teenager in his home, especially considering he had prior convictions involving minors. Back in 2014 he was convicted of lewd and lascivious battery involving a minor between 12 and 15 so him hiding a 17-year-old in his closet definitely raised alarms.
“A 30-year old male sex offender is not the kind of person you want giving a 17-year old girl a place to stay,” Polk County Sheriff Grady Judd said, “I can assure you that Alexis Diaz-Toledo did not have the missing juvenile’s best interests in mind.”
Following the discovery in his house Diaz-Toledo was placed under arrest and charged with two counts of failure to comply with his sex offender registration requirements. He was also hit with three more charges: interfering with custody of a minor, sheltering a minor without notifying a parent and providing false information to law enforcement during a missing person investigation.
What exactly happened between Diaz-Toledo and the minor while she was in his home is not clear. It’s also unclear how exactly they knew each other. Regardless, as of Wednesday Alexis Diaz-Toledo is being held in custody in Polk County jail and isn’t even eligible for bond.
