Greensburg police got an assist Thursday from the Westmoreland County Sheriff’s Department in a week-long search for a convicted child abuser wanted on a new complaint.
Police Det. Charles Irvin obtained an arrest warrant last week for Paul A. Chamberlain, 32, a former city resident whose last known address was in Latrobe. Irvin was investigating a recent tip from ChildLine, the statewide hotline to report child abuse cases, that Chamberlain had repeatedly abused a girl at her Greensburg home between 2008-12.
Police had been unable to locate Chamberlain until receiving a tip that he may work at the UPS facility in New Stanton, Irvin said.
“I got a call early (Thursday) morning that deputies arrested him there where he was working as a package handler,” Irvin said.
Chamberlain was being held in the county jail on $300,000 bond after arraignment on charges of corruption of minors, indecent assault on a person less than 13 years old, indecent assault by threat and simple assault.
In a recent interview with the accuser, Irvin reported in court documents that Chamberlain knew the girl’s mother when the girl was in elementary school. Irvin reported that the girl told him that Chamberlain would sneak into her bedroom to sexually assault her.
She told Irvin that Chamberlain also threatened her.
“One time, she remembered that Chamberlain scraped a knife across her arm causing a small cut,” Irvin wrote.
Chamberlain, who has also recently used addresses in Derry, has an extensive criminal history dating back to 2008.
That year, Greensburg police arrested him on charges of corruption of minors, forcible rape and indecent assault. Online court dockets show he pleaded guilty to corruption of minors in 2008 and received one year probation. In 2012, state police arrested Chamberlain on a corruption of minors charge in Greensburg. He received a 23-month jail sentence, court records show.
He has court hearings pending for a 2018 harassment case filed by Derry Borough police and 2018 theft case filed by Greensburg police.
