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NANTICOKE — A one-time volunteer firefighter accused of assaulting an 8-year-old girl is heading to higher court on felony charges.
Michael Sansone, currently free on $250,000 bail, appeared before Magisterial District Judge Donald Whittaker for a preliminary hearing on Wednesday. Whittaker forwarded Sansone’s charges of rape, involuntary sexual intercourse, unlawful contact with a minor, aggravated assault of a minor and endangering the welfare of a child to Luzerne County Court of Common Pleas.
Sansone was charged in May after a complaint by the alleged victim’s mother. The abuse allegedly took place within the last year, according to testimony at the hearing.
Nanticoke police Capt. Robert Lehman testified that the 8-year-old girl, in interviews with Children Advocacy Center, Luzerne County Children and Youth Services and the Luzerne County District Attorney’s Office, alleged Sansone had sexually assaulted her.
When pressed by defense counsel Gary Marchalk as to the exact language used to describe the incident, Lehman said the victim initially used symbolic language, but eventually gave an explicit description of the abuse.
Lehman said the alleged abuse was witnessed by the victim’s brother.
When Marchalk asked if the victim’s mother had been aware of the abuse, Assistant District Attorney Angela Sperrazza objected, saying the defense was fishing for other witnesses. Whittaker sustained the objection.
Sperrazza asked that the conditions of Sansone’s bail include no contact with the alleged victims and no unsupervised contact with any minor child.
“These are felony charges,” she said.
Whittaker granted the request to include the additional terms as a condition of Sansone’s bail.