By BARBARA GREEN
editor@bowienewsonline.com
Ricky Dale Howard, a person of interest in the spring 2015 disappearance of Caleb Diehl, was indicted this week on 15 new felony counts that include indecency with a child connected with Diehl and 12 counts of possession of child pornography with unknown victims.
District Attorney Casey Polhemus said the indictment was issued by the grand jury in a special Tuesday session.
The 57-year-old Nocona man has been serving prison time in the Hamilton Unit of the state prison system in Bryan since June 2016 when he pled guilty to possession of firearms by a felon. He received five years on the 11 counts. As a convicted felon for federal bank fraud it is illegal for him to possess firearms.
Howard was up for parole consideration earlier this summer, but it was denied in July after he was indicted in April on two counts of indecency with a child sexual contact and 34 counts of child pornography.
Thus far in the investigation that began with the search for Diehl on April 1, 2015, Howard has been indicted in sexual indecency cases involving three male victims, including Diehl and two others. (See the related timeline story).
Howard has since moved to the Robertson Unit in Abilene where he may serve out the remainder of the five-year term which ends in 2021.
New indictment
The first three counts in Tuesday’s indictments involve missing teen Caleb Diehl said Polhemus. It is one count of first degree felony indecency with a child sexual contact and two counts of second degree felony indecency with a child by exposure.
The indictment states the alleged incidents occurred on March 15, 2011. Polhemus says evidence in all these cases surfaced during the examination of of Howard’s computer seized during an earlier search.
Polhemus said this was another “cog” in the wheel as the investigators continue to plug away at these cases, including Diehl’s disappearance.
“It links him with Caleb, but we can’t prove anything other than what is stated at this time. We will continue pursuing the investigation,” said the DA.
The rest are 12 counts of second degree felony possession of child pornography.
Prosecution
The 97th District Attorney has gained some assistance from an experienced prosecutor as former longtime DA Tim Cole has joined the investigation team as an assistant DA.

Read the full story in the weekend News.