Lodi Mayor's Basement Searched In Sex Abuse Investigation
LODI (CBS13) - Lodi's mayor is in the middle of a disturbing investigation. Cops say she's not the target - but her basement is.
Mayor Joanne Mounce had a house guest who stayed in her basement. He was arrested on child molestation charges just days after moving out.
"I have nothing to hide and I'm proud of my home and who I am," she told CBS13 on Monday after her quiet and quaint home was served with a police search warrant.
"It's just unfortunate when you help other people, sometimes that doesn't always work out the way you anticipate it to," she said.
This summer Mounce let Lodi chef and activist David Nielsen live in her basement for a couple of weeks. Police arrested Nielsen on a child molestation charge just five days after he moved out
So the mayor's home suddenly became a target for evidence in the case against him. Cops say they found nothing.
"At the mayor's, house absolutely not," Lodi Police Cpl. Dale Eubanks said. "She has been very cooperative, forthcoming. I think she was probably duped, like some others."
Now Mounce says she will be more careful about the company she keeps.
"Of course my judgment in regards to helping people, I just need to create a larger buffer around me when I help people and not let them so close to me," she said.
The mayor says she had become friends with Nielsen through his work as a chef and activist and he had brought her food a year ago, when she was diagnosed with cancer.
"Mr. Nielsen was not who he said he was," she said. "You feel like you're betrayed and your friendship had been breached."
Police believe Nielsen's alleged sex abuse of a minor occurred between February and May. He was living with the mayor in July.
