Man Charged For Seeking Sex With Girl, 13, In Bensalem

BENSALEM TOWNSHIP, PA — A Montgomery County man has been charged for trying to seek sex who he believed was a 13-year-old girl who attended middle school, police said.

Eric Karch, 53, of Jenkintown, was charged with Attempted Involuntary Deviate Sexual Intercourse, Unlawful Contact with a Minor, Sexual Abuse of Children/Photo, Corruption of Minors, Criminal Use of a Communication Facility, and related offenses.

He was arraigned by District Justice Joseph Falcone and sent to the Bucks County Correctional Facility on 10 percent of $10 million bail.

Bensalem Police said on Saturday that Karch struck up a conversation on a social media dating app with a girl attending middle school.

Police said Karch quickly took the conversation in a sexual direction and told her that she should try to sleep naked, take photographs of herself while naked in bed, and send them to him. A short time later, Karch sent a picture of his penis to the juvenile and stated that he wanted to perform sexual acts with her, police said.

The conversation continued the following week when Karch requested to meet the girl for sex and then asked again for nude photographs. He continued to describe all of the sexual acts he wanted to perform on her in explicit detail and told her that he wanted her to call him "daddy" while she performed sexual acts on him, police said.

Karch took a SEPTA bus on Thursday from his home in Jenkintown to meet with the girl in Bensalem.

Once there, Bensalem police were waiting. Karch was taken into custody and discovered that he had condoms that he brought with him for the sexual encounter.

No children were in danger during this investigation, police said.