A jury deliberated for about an hour Tuesday before finding a Cabot man guilty of inappropriately touching a 15-year-old girl in 2023.

Michael G. Saunders, 50, of Cabot, was convicted of indecent assault and corruption of minors charges filed by Buffalo Township police in 2024 following an October 2023 incident, which led to a one-day trial in Butler County Common Pleas Court.

Judge Joseph Kubit ordered Saunders to undergo an evaluation under the Sex Offender Registration and Notification Act, which takes 90 days, before he sentences him. Sentencing is expected to be scheduled for January.

The now-18-year-old woman testified Saunders was a family friend whom she met when she visited a Sarver veterans club on taco nights with her grandmother, who she lives with.

Sometime before Halloween in October 2023, she said her grandmother told her Saunders was coming to their home. He arrived and all three watched a football game on TV. The woman said she watched for a while then went to her bedroom.

Sometime later, Saunders opened the bedroom door, asked her if she wanted to cuddle, got on her bed and put his hand under the hoodie she was wearing and placed it on her abdomen, and she got up and left the room, she said.

She said she didn’t respond when Saunders asked her if she wanted to cuddle and she was covered with a blanket that he reached under to reach under her shirt.

“I said I had to go to the bathroom and excused myself,” she said.

She said she spent a couple minutes in the bathroom processing what happened before she told her grandmother about the incident. Her grandmother then kicked him out of the home.

After the incident, she said she got a new bed, even though there was nothing wrong with the bed she had.

“I just don’t want to have those memories in bed,” she said.

Since the incident, she said doesn’t like being alone with males.

She said she didn’t immediately report the incident to police because she didn’t know if anyone would believe her and she was afraid to say what happened.

Defense attorney Chelsie Friend asked her about inconsistencies between her testimony and what she told investigators during a forensic interview in 2024.

Friend pointed out that, during the interview, she couldn’t remember when the incident took place, but thought it occurred around wintertime because of cold weather at the time.

She said the woman initially testified she never interacted with Saunders, but then remembered him giving her grandmother money for the woman to get a tattoo when all three were at the veterans club.

Friend asked the woman if she remembered saying during the interview she was sitting on her bed with her knees bent when Saunders entered her bedroom. The woman said she didn’t remember saying that. She testified she was lying on her bed when the incident occurred.

She also asked the woman if she remembered saying in the interview that Saunders put his hand on her rib. The woman testified he “kind of caressed” her abdomen with his finger.

The woman’s grandmother testified she has known Saunders for many years and he was friends with her deceased son.

On the day of the incident, she said he called, which he regularly did around her son’s birthday in October, and asked if he could visit. She said she trusted Saunders at the time and allowed him to visit. He brought a 15-pack of beer.

The grandmother said she made a frozen pizza, Saunders drank a beer and all three talked while a football game was on TV. She said Saunders offered to take her granddaughter trick or treating with his grandchildren.

“Seconds” after Saunders said he was going to the bathroom, she said her granddaughter ran out of her bedroom, screamed that Saunders was in her bed and ran into the bathroom.

She said she didn’t see Saunders enter her granddaughter’s bedroom, but found him there sprawled on her bed.

“I kicked him a few times and hit him,” the grandmother said.

The incident occurred sometime between Oct. 16 and Halloween, she said.

Following the incident, she said she confronted Saunders about it a couple times, but he wouldn’t talk about it.

After the incident, she said her granddaughter lost weight, slept with her in her bed, wouldn’t sleep in her own bed and the grandmother had to buy her a new bed.

She said she let her granddaughter decide about reporting the incident to police, but a friend of hers reported the incident through ChildLine.