Douglas Walker

dwalker@muncie.gannett.com

NEW CASTLE — When asked by police this week why he had been running naked near downtown New Castle, 55-year-old Danny R. Riggs said he had been forced to do so by a man with a rifle.

In fact, Riggs kept pointing to the gunman, “who was not there,” a city officer wrote in a report.

Police were called to the 200 block of North 16th Street, near the Veterans of Foreign Wars lodge, shortly before 8 p.m. Monday after dispatchers received reports of a man “naked and hiding in bushes.”

In that area, officers were flagged down by a 16-year-old motorist, who reported she and her 10-year-old passenger had seen “a naked male running past them.”

Another citizen then gave officer better news — the man was on the railroad tracks at 15th and Thornburg streets, but “now had pants on.”

Police reported they found Riggs — whom they recognized — “standing on the tracks putting on a shirt.”

A foot chase then ensued. As Riggs climbed a chain-link fence, an officer deployed an electronic stun device, and the New Castle man “immediately dropped to the ground.”

Riggs allegedly made “several statements which made no sense,” an officer wrote, including an assertion he was forced to disrobe by an armed man on the roof of a home “more than a quarter-mile away.”

The New Castle man was taken to Henry County Hospital for an examination before being placed in the Henry County jail.

On Wednesday, Henry County Prosecutor Joe Bergacs’ office charged Riggs with resisting law enforcement, a Class A misdemeanor carrying up to a year in jail, and public nudity, a Class B misdemeanor with a maximum 180-day sentence.

At a hearing that day in Henry Circuit Court 3, Riggs pleaded guilty to the resisting charge, but not guilty to the nudity count, which is still pending.

He is scheduled to stand trial Nov. 15 in the same court on a domestic battery charge filed last March.

His criminal record includes convictions — most recorded between 1999 and 2002 — for intimidation, driving while intoxicated (at least four times), resisting law enforcement and leaving the scene of an accident.

Contact news reporter Douglas Walker at (765) 213-5851. Follow him on Twitter: @DouglasWalkerSP.

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