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First Posted: 4/15/2014
HANOVER TWP. — A former anti-crime activist was charged Tuesday with having a sexual relationship with a woman that began when she was 15.
John Dehart, 46, was arraigned by District Judge Joseph Halesey on two counts of involuntary deviate sexual intercourse and one count each of statutory sexual assault and endangering the welfare of children. Bail was set at $50,000.
Dehart has been jailed since his arrest on related child-endangerment charges in October.
Police said the woman has six children with Dehart.
According to the criminal complaint:
The woman told police Dehart began sleeping with her when his wife left him sometime in August 2004, when she was 15.
Dehart allegedly had sexual encounters with her when they lived in Hanover Township, Mountain Top and Kingston. She said the encounters started out as once a week, but they increased to every other day lasting until 2007, the complaint says.
When questioned by police on April 10, Dehart allegedly admitted to having sex with the woman when she was a teenager, the complaint says.
A preliminary hearing is scheduled on April 29.
Dehart was a self-proclaimed anti-crime activist who formed Citizens Against Crime in the mid-2000s and would often stand on street corners in the Wyoming Valley holding signs that urged residents to “report a drug dealer” by calling the phone number he had listed for that community’s police department.
Dehart and his stepdaughter, Sara Lee Miller, 24, initially were arrested in Lancaster on Oct. 1.
Police say Miller raped a teenage boy and sexually assaulted a teenage girl when she and Dehart lived on Wyoming Street in Hanover Township.
Dehart was charged with endangering the welfare of children, and Miller was charged with rape of a child in October. Their cases remain open in Luzerne County Court.
