JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — A former Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office lieutenant is in the St. Johns County Jail charged with three counts of sexual battery against a child.
The case dates to 2005, when the child was between the ages of 6-8.
First Coast News has learned the recent arrest of Christopher Tyree is just the latest in a string of sexual allegations made against the former officer, including several when he was still a JSO employee.
The current criminal case is the only one that resulted in formal charges. Tyree has pleaded not guilty and is being held on a $1.5 million bond.
He has since left the agency, where he worked for a period that included 1991-2012. A JSO spokesperson said he could not answer a series of questions about the case, including when the agency learned about the allegations against Tyree. He said those questions would need to be submitted as a public records request. A request for details about the time of Tyree's employment and the terms of his departure has not yet been filled. Tyree's attorney declined to comment.
According to a police report in the current case, the alleged victim contacted law enforcement in April 2022, reporting abuse when she was a child. She said Tyree began abusing her during sleepovers, including sexual intercourse when she was six years old. The report says St. Johns County Sheriff’s Office detectives located a prior 2007 criminal complaint made by two girls, ages 9 and 10, who said he touched them inappropriately. They also found a 2017 case from Volusia County in which he was accused of inappropriate conversations with a 14-year-old over Instagram. He was also investigated in 2013 for having a sexual relationship with a relative.
The report says investigators had one alleged victim place a “control call” to Tyree on a recorded line. “As a result of the control call, the defendant denied any inappropriate actions or wrongdoing,” the report says. “However, the defendant stated, ‘I’m so sorry if anything I ever did or said made you feel uncomfortable because it was never meant to be.’ ‘Yeah, yeah and I don't remember any of that. You know we only lived in that house for a year. So it’s uh, it was a very short time, but I don’t remember any of that. If I ever made you feel uncomfortable, I don’t know what else to say. I am so sorry. That was never any intention to make anybody feel uncomfortable. I know I would not just arbitrarily help a girl just change out of her clothes or any of that.’”
The report says detectives interviewed Tyree on Nov. 12, 2022. According to the report, “the defendant met with detectives and denied all allegations. The defendant advised he spoke to [redacted] recently (Control Call) and stated he had not been in any trouble after the SJSO070FF009714 investigation. When questioned about the [Volusia County Sheriff’s Office] report, the defendant advised they (he and the juvenile) just shared some ‘I love you's’ and it was nothing serious.”
First Coast News spoke to the mother of one of his alleged child victims. The girl told her mother and police that Tyree would tickle her inner thighs with a vibrator and would lay between her and his daughter under a blanket during sleepovers. The woman said her daughter has struggled since that time. The mother said she personally complained to JSO at the time but they did not consider the vibrator incident criminal in nature.
“We never thought we’d be here,” she said of his recent arrest.
