Man pleads guilty in child sex abuse case

Before his defense team could tell his side of the story, Troy Oskerson pleaded guilty to indecency with a child in Travis County court Thursday morning.

The deal, reached after the state rested Wednesday, spared Oskerson a potential life sentence had he been convicted on the more serious charge of continuous sexual abuse of a child. After the deal, which calls for Oskerson to serve 10 years in prison, he was taken into custody.

Prosecutors claimed Oskerson abused a young girl, who is now in middle school, multiple times at a North Austin apartment complex between 2008 and 2010.

On Wednesday, a forrmer interviewer with the Center for Child Protection testified the girl told him in one incident, Oskerson abused both her and a friend. The girl told him she recorded portions of the abuse on her iPod Nano but Oskerson saw the device and deleted the video.

The AmericanStatesman is not identifying the girl due to the nature of the crime.

The trial, which started Monday, was halted for a time on Wednesday after one juror came down with strep throat. Judge Jim Coronado ruled the case could proceed with a panel of 11.

Oskerson’s family members said the charges were false and said Oskerson took the plea so he could better care for his son.

Prosecutors said Thursday the victim’s family was satisfied with the terms of the deal, which also require Oskerson to be registered as a sex offender.

Oskerson for a time was publisher of The Fugitive Post, a free tabloid paper that published crime news and mug shots.

He told the Statesman in 2006 that he got the idea for the paper while working as a private investigator chasing down fugitive bail-jumpers. Witnesses at Oskerson’s trial said that when he saw police approach through the apartment door’s peep hole, he jumped a fence and ran, becoming a fugitive himself.