A registered sex offender is accused of raping a young girl after offering to babysit so her parents could spend time together.

Robert Leonard Hutsell, 44, knew the girl's father from high school but lost contact until late last year, court documents say.

The father told Spokane police he didn't know of Hutsell's background until detectives began investigating allegations that Hutsell molested the girl.

Hutsell took the girl and her siblings to his home at 543 E. Crown Ave., for an overnight stay in February, according to court documents. The girl later told her mother of inappropriate contact.

Police contacted Hutsell at the Benton County Jail in Kennewick, where they say he admitted to the contact. Hutsell appeared in Spokane County Superior Court today on a $250,000 warrant for first-degree rape of a child and first-degree child molestation and remains in jail.

Hutsell was convicted in Spokane County of first-degree rape of a child in 1999.

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