Court House Man Given Up to 55 Years for Sex Crimes

COURT HOUSE – The Bucks County District Attorney’s Office, in Pennsylvania, announced the sentencing of a Court House man on charges that he sexually assaulted five boys March 21.
James Carey, 54, who was residing in Court House at the time of his arrest, was a former Warminster Township police officer. He was arrested April 7, 2021, and entered an open no-contest plea Oct. 27, 2022. Carey was sentenced March 21 to 24.5 to 55 years in prison.
Carey was arrested for acts that occurred while he was working as a Drug Abuse Resistance Education (D.A.R.E.) officer, as a volunteer firefighter, and while he was running a program for troubled youth at the township’s recreation center more than two decades ago, the district attorney’s press release said.
Carey pleaded no-contest on each of the five counts of involuntary deviant sexual intercourse and corruption of minors, seven counts of indecent assault, two counts each of statutory rape and statutory sexual assault and one count of aggravated indecent assault.
Prior to sentencing, Judge Wallace H. Bateman Jr. heard impact statements from the five victims who testified about the emotional trauma the former officer inflicted on them.
One man said the damage caused years of anger and resentment, leading to substance abuse, incarceration, and suicide attempts. Another said his chance at a normal life was stolen by a “monster of a human being.”
Another victim said he lived his adolescent years in fear, blaming himself for Carey’s actions.
“I spent my whole adult life hating myself,” the district attorney quoted the victim as saying. “This has impacted every aspect of my life: Physically, mentally, financially and emotionally.”
According to the district attorney, the judge noticed that Carey wouldn’t look at the victims as they made their statements or look at their childhood photos projected on a screen in the courtroom. Judge Bateman called Carey a coward who used his “badge and uniform as weapons of his depravity.”
First Assistant District Attorney Jennifer Schorn said Carey not only used his positions as a police officer and a volunteer firefighter to lure his victims, he also used their families, the community and even the court system.
“He ingratiated himself into the lives of his victims. This is how he identified the most vulnerable among them. This is how he got away with perpetrating unimaginable sexual crimes upon children,” said Schorn.
The district attorney’s office said Schorn described Carey as a “predator waiting to pounce.” She credited detectives for locating the victims and praised the victims for their courage.
The district attorney said Carey was arrested after a lengthy investigation by Bucks County detectives and an inquiry by a Bucks County Investigating Grand Jury that found Carey sexually assaulted four boys between 1989 and 2009.
The month following the publicity of his arrest, a fifth victim came forward and Carey faced additional charges. The victim in that case said he was 13 when Carey sexually assaulted him.
Carey was a uniformed officer assigned to the D.A.R.E. program and used his position to take advantage of victims, the district attorney said. At a preliminary hearing in June 2021, the victims, now in their 30s and 40s, testified about the repeated abuse by Carey. Most of the assaults happened while Carey was in uniform, the victims testified.
Carey was a police officer for Warminster Township from 1989 to 2009 and previously worked for the North Wales Police Department in Montgomery County (June 1988 to August 1988) and the Warwick Township Police Department (July 1988 to May 1989).
In addition to the sentence, Carey was also deemed a sexually violent predator. During the March 21 sentencing, Bateman criticized the actions of the police department while Carey worked there for failing to do more for the victims.