According to the Oneida County Sheriff’s Office Chief…

According to the Oneida County Sheriff’s Office Chief Deputy Derrick O'Meara, who is the Director of the Oneida County Child Advocacy Center, a Town of Lee man has been charged with having inappropriate contact with an underage female child.

The investigation began in January of 2021 when members of the Child Advocacy Center were notified that a female child under the age of 13 had been subjected to sexual contact by 36-year-old Shawn Westcott. The case was assigned to Sheriff’s Investigator Nicholas Dean who is assigned to the Child Advocacy Center.

Investigator Dean’s investigation revealed that Westcott had subjected the child to sexual contact over the course of a year in 2019, in the Town of Lee.

At the conclusion of the investigation, the case was turned over to the Oneida County District Attorney’s Office for Grand Jury consideration.

Subsequent to the indictment by the Oneida County Grand Jury, Westcott was taken in to custody by the Oneida Count Sheriff’s Warrants Unit and was arraigned in Oneida County Court. Westcott was charged with Predatory Sexual Assault Against a Child, a Class A-II Felony, and Criminal Sexual Act in the First Degree, a Class B Felony, and Sexual Abuse in the First Degree, a Class D Felony.

Westcott was remanded to the Oneida County Correctional Facility in lieu of $40,000 bail.

Services have been offered to the victim by the Child Advocacy Center and an order of protection was issued on behalf of the child.