Kids, Sex and Crack Cocaine

MIDDLETOWN - Three youngsters, including a boy and girl as young as 12, are being treated for crack cocaine addiction, and one had sex in exchange for the highly addictive drug, authorities said.

That's the fallout, police and prosecutors say, from a two-month investigation that ended in indictments this week of the mother of two of the youngsters and two former neighbors at the Williamsburg Place Apartments on Jackson Lane.

"This is deeply, deeply disturbing," Butler County Prosecutor Robin Piper said Friday. "It shows people will do just about anything to feed the addiction."

A county grand jury charged Lola McKinney, 39, Elizabeth Ann Tabar, 26, and Tabar's mother, Darlene Griffin, 52, each with three felony counts of corrupting another with drugs and three felony counts of permitting drug abuse.

Tabar also faces a felony charge of complicity to rape for allegedly encouraging the 12-year-old, who lived in the complex but is not related to any of the women, to have sex with a man in exchange for crack. Police still are investigating the man.

Tabar has been jailed on a $150,000 bond since her arrest in March. Griffin, who recently was evicted, and McKinney, who still lives there, remain free and are scheduled to appear in Butler County Common Pleas Court for an arraignment hearing May 9.

McKinney and Griffin were not charged earlier, but were indicted after the grand jury heard evidence this week.