Farrell D. Madden is out on bail after he turned himself in to Killeen police on a misdemeanor charge out of Morgan’s Point for harboring a runaway child.
Madden lives in a condominium near the home of the girl but neither she nor her family knew him before the missing person’s case unfolded, said Randy Dixon, Morgan’s Point police chief.
An investigator who interviewed Madden said Madden picked the girl up at Lake Belton and brought her to his home and allowed her to spend the night after she told him she was a runaway.
The next day as police searched the girl’s neighborhood with bloodhounds, Madden drove her to a Dollar General Store on West Adams Street in Temple and bought her a pair of shoes.
After purchasing the shoes, Madden dropped the girl off at her grandparents’ home in Temple.
The nearly 24-hour search was called off when the grandparents phoned the girl’s mother to tell her that her daughter was safe with them.
In addition to combing the neighborhood, divers searched the channel near the marina in an attempt to rule out the possibility that she had drowned.
Dixon said that at one point the girl reported watching as divers searched for her body.
Police say she was able to identify Madden from the name off a prescription pill bottle in his bathroom.
The girl’s shoes, sweatshirt and schoolbooks were found on a bank near the Morgan’s Point Marina on the afternoon of Oct. 21. Dixon said she told him she swam the channel in jeans and a shirt. He added that she was concerned she would be in trouble at home because of something that happened at school that day, but he did not elaborate on that incident.
An Amber Alert was not issued in the case because there was no evidence the girl’s disappearance was the result of a criminal act.
A conviction on a Class A misdemeanor could bring up to a year in jail and $4,000 fine.
