Bowling alley manager faces Aug. 18 trial

www.sahuaritasun.com

TUCSON — William Edward “Billy” O’Rourke will face trial Aug. 18 on felony charges involving a 12-year-old boy.

O’Rourke, 35, of Sahuarita, the manager of the Green Valley Lanes bowling alley, faces charges that include aggravated assault, furnishing obscene items to minors and public sexual indecency to a minor after an October altercation with the boy, who he described as “like a son.”

O’Rourke appeared alone in Pima County Superior Court on Tuesday before Judge Pro Tempore Howard Fell. While other defendants were called, including several men manacled together in orange jail jump suits, O’Rourke fidgeted so quietly in his seat that the prosecutor did not notice him until the judge pointed him out. O’Rourke’s defense lawyer, Richard D. Gierloff, addressed the court by telephone from his office in Phoenix.

Assistant County Attorney Jonathan Mosher said he expected the jury trial to take four days.

O’Rourke declined comment after the hearing. The mother of the boy, who lives in Green Valley, also was in court and declined comment.

O’Rourke could also face a civil lawsuit in the case; private attorney Brad Roach appeared in court and said he represented the victim. Roach did not comment outside court. Typically, civil cases are not pursued until the criminal case is resolved.

O’Rourke, who has been technical advisor to a youth bowling team in the Sahuarita area for several years, is accused of having “committed public sexual indecency to a minor by intentionally or knowingly committing an act of sexual contact by masturbating in front of the victim and/or by causing the victim to masturbate in front of the defendant.”

O’Rourke told a Pima County Sheriff’s deputy that he and the boy masturbated together a dozen times at O’Rourke’s Sahuarita home, according to court records.

Court documents said the two repeatedly watched pornographic videos and that O’Rourke physically assaulted the boy when he tried to break off the relationship.

O’Rourke denied sexual activity and told the Green Valley News in February that he went to the boy’s apartment to retrieve a Playstation3 in October, and they ended up in a struggle.

“He swung at me and I tried to calm him down,” O’Rourke said. “I put him in a bear hug and held him down.”

Witnesses said O’Rourke refused requests to leave the boy’s home, tried to enter the boy’s locked bedroom door, then wrestled the boy to the ground when the boy tried to leave the apartment.

pfranchine@sahuaritasun.com | 547-9738