LOS ANGELES (CA)
Los Angeles Times
November 19, 2018
By Richard Winton and Maya Lau
A Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputy assigned to handle sensitive sex abuse crimes, often involving vulnerable minors, has been arrested on suspicion of raping a 14-year-old girl in a case he was investigating.
Neil Kimball was taken into custody Friday evening after a monthlong inquiry into the allegations by the sheriff’s criminal internal investigation bureau. He was booked on suspicion of rape by force and preventing or dissuading a victim from testifying.
The 45-year-old investigator with the special victims unit met the girl during the “scope of his work,” a department spokeswoman said Monday.
Kimball, a 20-year department veteran, has investigated dozens of child molestation cases in Los Angeles County as a member of the elite specialized unit since 2013.
“The investigation and arrest resulted from information provided to the department by a member of the public,” the Sheriff’s Department said in a statement. It did not announce the arrest Friday and provided the statement after an inquiry by The Times.
Kimball was investigated previously, after a woman told the Sheriff’s Department in February 2009 that Kimball had grabbed her hand several months earlier and tried to make her touch his genitals, according to a memo from the Los Angeles County district attorney’s office. Prosecutors ultimately declined to charge Kimball in the case.
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