The string of trouble that followed John Tarver to Salt Lake City stretches back to his childhood, according to law enforcement officers and court documents.
The prison parolee has active arrest warrants for sex crimes and traces his problems to his childhood. He says he was repeatedly sodomized by his grandfather and father from the time he was a small boy until he left home at the age of 16.Tarver told officials he hated his father but was fond of his grandfather, despite the sexual abuse.
He said his father beat him severely with a two-by-four as often as five times a week.
Tarver would sluff his gym classes at school because he didn't want his classmates to see the bruises and abrasions that covered his back and legs, he said.
Tarver was paroled in 1987 after serving seven years for a conviction on first-degree robbery and second-degree assault charges.
Lt. Norm Nickerson, Spokane County sheriff's spokesman, said Tarver had been living in Idaho and had moved to Spokane recently, where he lived with his wife of two months and her three children.
A warrant accusing Tarver of "lewdness with a minor" with a young boy from a February incident was issued in Coeur d'Alene, Idaho, Friday morning. Nickerson said Tarver knew of the Idaho charge.
Before he was arraigned in Federal Court Friday evening, Tarver told a court official he had had no income during the past year because he has been in jail. He said he owns no property besides his car and said his wife and three stepsons are on welfare.
He had sought employment in Spokane through the LDS Church Employment Office, which ended up being a means of tracking him to Salt Lake City after 9-year-old Amber Kern was abducted Wednesday.
Tarver's face was familiar when he arrived at the Salt Lake Foursquare Church asking for help with bus fare Friday morning. The church caretaker who greeted the man at the church recognized him as a visitor to the church from several years ago.
And later in the Friday standoff, another member of the church's congregation told police Tarver had been to her house a number of times when he had lived in Salt Lake City. She asked police during the standoff if she could talk to Tarver but was not allowed to take part in the negotiation.