ST. CLOUD - Video cameras hidden in the walls of a St. Cloud child's bathroom and bedroom led to the arrest this week of a family friend initially
accused of wiring the house for his sexual pleasure, according to the Osceola County Sheriff's Office.
Brent Galbraith,
a 36-year-old electrician, now faces charges of repeatedly molesting the girl between the ages of 5 and 7, records show.
The arrest follows a two-month investigation in which the child first told investigators she thought Galbraith was "a little weird but would not elaborate." That changed last week after Galbraith was hospitalized at a mental-health facility in Kissimmee, where he claimed he wanted to harm himself over accusations of burglarizing the child's home and voyeurism, records show.
Within days, the child told a state Department of Children and Families case worker that Galbraith had touched her inappropriately in the past, records show.
During a subsequent interview with the youngster by a Child Advocacy Center specialist, she described how Galbraith had forced her to undress while he did the same and then molested her. The girl said that happened four times, records show.
The case began Aug. 10 with the discovery of the cameras with audio, video and power cables running outside the child's home to a locked electrical utility box, which did not contain a recording device, records state.
The child's older brother spotted the first camera in an air vent above her bedroom. A search of the attic found the second camera mounted behind a hole in her bathroom's shower door frame so it could record anyone taking a shower, records state.
On Sept. 8, Galbraith admitted to a sheriff's detective that he had
installed the cameras three years earlier while the child's family was away on vacation. Asked why, Galbraith said "he had an infatuation with the child" and that he was ashamed of his behavior, records show.
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