Business owner convicted of molesting two boys

Butler County man faces 10-year sentence

A federal jury on Wednesday convicted Jim Leroy, a Butler County business owner, of molesting two boys on trips to Florida and Michigan in 2015 and 2016.

Jurors deliberated a short time over lunch before returning the verdict following two days of testimony before U.S. District Judge Arthur Schwab.

The judge set sentencing for June 5.

Mr. Leroy, 54, of Penn Township, was led out of the courtroom in handcuffs and will remain in federal custody. He faces a mandatory minimum of a decade behind bars and could get more.

The prosecution rested on Tuesday after presenting three teenage victims who said Mr. Leroy molested them.

Mr. Leroy and his lawyer, Steven Townsend, did not present a defense. Mr. Leroy chose not to take the stand.

The FBI said he molested four boys in all who had worked for him at Jimi Enterprises, his auto repair and tire shop on Pittsburgh Road.

Prosecutors, however, chose to bring charges involving only two, ages 11 and 15, who testified Monday and Tuesday.

The 15-year-old, from a broken home in Butler and whose father had worked for Mr. Leroy, was the main witness. He

said Mr. Leroy took him on vacations to Florida, Texas and Michigan, where he said Mr. Leroy plied him with alcohol and pills and molested him in hotels.

He said Mr. Leroy paid him cash or bought him lottery tickets and told him never to tell anyone.

The trip to Michigan last February appeared to be the tipping point for the teen. On that trip, an 11-year-old accompanied them to Surfari Joe’s, a water park near Grand Rapids. During the stay, the 15-year-old said Mr. Leroy put a sleep medication in the younger boy’s sandwich and on his pizza. Concerned that Mr. Leroy was trying to drug the boy to molest him, he said he confronted Mr. Leroy and punched him.

Back home, he told his stepmother about Mr. Leroy and then the children and youth agency in Butler. Eventually, he repeated the story to Penn Township police and the FBI, which recreated all of the trips out of state using hotel and restaurant receipts, cell phone records and airline tickets.

FBI Agent Tom Carter said all the records corroborated details of the boys’ stories about where they had gone and what they’d done on trips with Mr. Leroy.

Mr. Leroy has been jailed since the indictment. He also faces state charges related to the case in Butler County.