{"id":18010,"date":"2026-02-12T10:02:25","date_gmt":"2026-02-12T16:02:25","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/trfnews.i234.me\/wordpress\/?p=18010"},"modified":"2026-02-22T18:46:53","modified_gmt":"2026-02-23T00:46:53","slug":"moorhead-man-charged-in-child-sex-assault-case","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/trfnews.i234.me\/wordpress\/moorhead-man-charged-in-child-sex-assault-case\/","title":{"rendered":"Moorhead: Man Charged in Child Sex Assault Case"},"content":{"rendered":"

Moorhead, Clay County<\/strong> (trfnews.i234.me<\/a>) \u2014 A Moorhead man is facing felony charges in a child sex assault case.<\/p>\n

Lawrence Alexander Leslie Jr is charged with first-degree criminal sexual conduct.<\/p>\n

He is also charged with second-degree criminal sexual conduct.<\/p>\n

The child\u2019s name is not being published.<\/p>\n

What the complaint says<\/h2>\n

According to court documents, a 12-year-old reported repeated sexual assaults.<\/p>\n

The report named Leslie Jr as the suspect.<\/p>\n

The child said the first incident happened when she was 10.<\/p>\n

She said she was cleaning her room at the time.<\/p>\n

She told investigators Leslie Jr came into the room.<\/p>\n

She said he started touching her in a sexual way.<\/p>\n

The child said another incident happened a short time later.<\/p>\n

She said she was on the phone with a friend.<\/p>\n

She told police Leslie Jr told her to hang up.<\/p>\n

She said he then came into her room and touched her again.<\/p>\n

Documents say Leslie Jr gave the child $15 after that incident.<\/p>\n

Investigators say the money was meant to stop her from telling anyone.<\/p>\n

The child described another incident in the complaint.<\/p>\n

She said she woke up and found Leslie Jr touching her.<\/p>\n

Documents say she later told a friend what happened.<\/p>\n

The complaint says Leslie Jr then confronted her about it.<\/p>\n

Police say he told her he could get into serious trouble.<\/p>\n

Documents say the last reported incident happened about one month before a forensic interview.<\/p>\n

\"Lawrence
Lawrence Alexander Leslie Jr<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Investigation timeline<\/h2>\n

Court documents say a detective was assigned the case on January 6.<\/p>\n

Investigators met with the child on January 15, according to the complaint.<\/p>\n

The case was later submitted for charging review.<\/p>\n

Court process and public records<\/h2>\n

Leslie Jr is presumed innocent unless proven guilty in court.<\/p>\n

Case records may appear on Minnesota Court Records Online (MCRO)<\/a>.<\/p>\n

State law for these charges is listed in Minn. Stat. 609.342<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Related statutes are also listed in Minn. Stat. 609.343<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Agency information is available from the Moorhead Police Department.<\/p>\n

If you need help<\/h2>\n

If you or someone you know needs support, help is available.<\/p>\n

You can contact RAINN<\/a> for crisis resources.<\/p>\n

You can also file a report through the NCMEC CyberTipline<\/a>.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m Chris Harper reporting for TRF News<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Moorhead, Clay County (trfnews.i234.me) \u2014 A Moorhead man is facing felony charges in a child sex assault case. Lawrence Alexander Leslie Jr is charged with first-degree criminal sexual conduct. He is also charged with second-degree criminal sexual conduct. The child\u2019s name is not being published. What the complaint says According to court documents, a 12-year-old… Continue reading Moorhead: Man Charged in Child Sex Assault Case<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":18187,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_wpscp_schedule_draft_date":"","_wpscp_schedule_republish_date":"","_wpscppro_advance_schedule":false,"_wpscppro_advance_schedule_date":"","_wpscppro_dont_share_socialmedia":null,"_wpscppro_custom_social_share_image":0,"_facebook_share_type":"default","_twitter_share_type":"default","_linkedin_share_type":"default","_pinterest_share_type":"default","_linkedin_share_type_page":"","_instagram_share_type":"default","_medium_share_type":"default","_threads_share_type":"default","_google_business_share_type":"default","_selected_social_profile":[],"_wpsp_enable_custom_social_template":false,"_wpsp_social_scheduling":{"enabled":false,"datetime":null,"platforms":[],"status":"template_only","dateOption":"today","timeOption":"now","customDays":"","customHours":"","customDate":"","customTime":"","schedulingType":"absolute"},"_wpsp_active_default_template":true},"categories":[12],"tags":[1135,871,770,12774,1122,1136,4065,772,957,1290,13127,151,3245,818,1304,1346,13126,1495,794,786],"class_list":["post-18010","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-crime","tag-assault","tag-case","tag-charged","tag-child-sexual-assault","tag-child","tag-clay-county","tag-court-complaint","tag-crime","tag-felony-charges","tag-first-degree-criminal-sexual-conduct","tag-lawrence-alexander-leslie-jr","tag-man","tag-mcro","tag-minnesota","tag-minnesota-statutes","tag-moorhead","tag-moorhead-man-facing-charges-for-allegedly-sexually-assaulting-a-child","tag-second-degree-criminal-sexual-conduct","tag-sex","tag-trf-news","entry"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/trfnews.i234.me\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18010","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/trfnews.i234.me\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/trfnews.i234.me\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/trfnews.i234.me\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/trfnews.i234.me\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18010"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/trfnews.i234.me\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18010\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":20318,"href":"https:\/\/trfnews.i234.me\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18010\/revisions\/20318"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/trfnews.i234.me\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/18187"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/trfnews.i234.me\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18010"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/trfnews.i234.me\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18010"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/trfnews.i234.me\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18010"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}