ROCKINGHAM — Police have filed charges against a convicted felon accused of molesting a child.
Investigators with the Rockingham Police Department say the alleged incidents were reported on Jan. 3.
The reported victim is under the age of 15, according to police.
No other details about the case were available.
The defendant, 49-year-old Jerry Lee Wade, was arrested March 3 and is charged with nine counts of taking indecent liberties with a child.
He was booked into the Richmond County Jail where he is being held on a $750,000 secured bond. Wade is scheduled to appear in court March 14.
Records with the N.C. Department of Adult Correction show Wade has a criminal history dating back three decades.
Wade was first convicted in 1990 of felony larceny. His probation was revoked the following year and he was incarcerated for three years and eight months.
While serving that sentence, Wade was convicted in 1993 of breaking and entering vehicles, damage to property, breaking and entering, and larceny; then in 1994 of misdemeanor larceny and common law forgery.
Wade remained in prison until February of 2000.
He was convicted of uttering a forged instrument in 2001, then of shoplifting (Robeson County) and resisting an officer the following year.
Wade was given probation for all three convictions, however, later in 2002, that was revoked and he was also convicted of possession of a Schedule VI controlled substance and another count of shoplifting (Moore County).
He spent seven months behind bars, and the following year was given probation when convicted of second-degree trespassing and operating a vehicle without a license.
Records appear to show Wade was also convicted in 2004 of possession of drug paraphernalia, second-degree trespassing and misdemeanor larceny.
(Note: It appears the offense date of the second trespassing charge is the same as the first.)
Wade’s probation on the vehicle charge was also revoked, and it appears a paraphernalia charge with the same date was tacked on.
He served nearly four months on those convictions and three days after his release was convicted of misdemeanor larceny and shoplifting in Scotland County.
Wade’s record is clean for nearly 17 years until convictions in June 2021 of felony conspiracy and misdemeanor charges of injury to real property and resisting an officer. His probation on the conspiracy conviction was revoked the following year, resulting in a three-month incarceration.
Online court records show Wade has several pending traffic violations from this year.
All defendants facing criminal charges are presumed innocent until proven guilty in a court of law.
