{"id":187842,"date":"2026-05-09T06:12:21","date_gmt":"2026-05-09T06:12:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/187842\/"},"modified":"2026-05-09T06:12:21","modified_gmt":"2026-05-09T06:12:21","slug":"paddy-purcell-arrested-bensalem-man-accused-of-touching-girl-after-entering-her-home","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/187842\/","title":{"rendered":"Paddy Purcell arrested: Bensalem man accused of touching girl after entering her home"},"content":{"rendered":"

BENSALEM TWP., Pennsylvania (WPVI) — A Bensalem Township, Pennsylvania man is facing charges after police say he entered his neighbor’s home and assaulted a young girl.<\/p>\n

It happened on March 12 just before 1 a.m.<\/p>\n

According to police, the 9-year-old victim was sleeping when she woke up to a man in her room wearing underwear.<\/p>\n

The victim told police she was touched inappropriately and believed the man wanted to have sex with her.<\/p>\n

According to court documents obtained by Action News, the girl was able to get her father who found the suspect, identified as 32-year-old Paddy Purcell, in the girl’s bed wrapped in a blanket.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

When Purcell was confronted, he fled out the front door, said police.<\/p>\n

Purcell, who police say lives nearby, was later arrested.<\/p>\n

Investigators believe he entered the home through an unlocked door. He also allegedly left his jacket and keys with his name on them inside the home.<\/p>\n

Purcell is being charged with Indecent Assault of Person Less than 13 Years of Age, Burglary and Criminal Trespassing.<\/p>\n

The girl’s father told police that he did not know the suspect.<\/p>\n

Copyright \u00a9 2026 WPVI-TV. All Rights Reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"BENSALEM TWP., Pennsylvania (WPVI) — A Bensalem Township, Pennsylvania man is facing charges after police say he entered…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":187843,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[83824,191,193,192,194,12055,83823,25988,26427,83822],"class_list":["post-187842","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-bensalem","tag-83824","tag-bensalem","tag-bensalem-headlines","tag-bensalem-news","tag-bensalem-township","tag-bensalem-township-pa","tag-bensalem-township-pennsylvania","tag-bensalem-township-police","tag-bucks-county-district-attorney","tag-paddy-purcell-arrested"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/187842","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=187842"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/187842\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/187843"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=187842"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=187842"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=187842"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}