MANLIUS, N.Y. (AP) – Federal agents equipped with underground radar, a backhoe and shovels began searching a second site Thursday for clues in the case of a 67-year-old retired handyman accused of holding at least five women as sex slaves in an underground bunker.

The search moved to a vacant house in Manlius owned by John Jamelske. FBI agents also searched a garage on the four-acre site but did not say if they found anything. Authorities did remove a septic tank from Jamelske’s home in the Syracuse suburb of DeWitt on Thursday and said they will examine its contents for forensic evidence.

Jamelske is being held in jail without bail on charges of kidnapping, rape, sodomy and sexual abuse.

He was arrested April 7 for holding a 16-year-old girl hostage for nearly seven months in a two-room concrete dungeon he built under the back yard of his suburban Syracuse home.

Since Jamelske’s arrest, four more women have told police they were abducted and raped by him. Prosecutors plan to present those cases to a grand jury.

J. Michael Forsyth, a lawyer for Jamelske, has said that there is another side to the case that will come out at the appropriate time.


Comments are no longer available on this story