A Monday preliminary hearing for a Vian man accused of child sexual abuse was continued.

Thomas Woodruff Sparacio, 31, was charged in Sequoyah County District Court in Sallisaw in February 2006 with three counts of child sexual abuse. The alleged victim was eight years old when the abuse first began.

According to the Sequoyah County District Attorney's Office, Sparacio's attorney asked for the continuance.

According to court records, Roger Fuller, an investigator with the Sequoyah County Sheriff's Office, received a phone call in October 2005 from an investigator with the Crawford County Sheriff's Office in Van Buren, Ark. The Crawford County investigator advised Fuller that a 17-year-old girl and her mother reported that the girl had been a victim of sexual abuse in Crawford and Sequoyah Counties. The girl told police that Sparacio was the alleged abuser.

The Crawford County investigator questioned Sparacio, who allegedly admitted to the sexual abuse. Sparacio was placed under arrest by Arkansas authorities.

On Sept. 27, 2005, Sparacio was charged with two counts of rape in Crawford County, which allegedly occurred between 1996 and 2000, officials said last year.

Fuller reported that the girl and her mother came to the Sequoyah County Sheriff's Office in Sallisaw in October 2005 to make a report of the alleged abuse that occurred in Sequoyah County.

The girl told Fuller that the abuse began in 1995 when she lived on Dwight Mission Road and continued until 1999. The girl told police that Sparacio allegedly made her watch pornographic movies with him and touched her inappropriately. The girl also reported that Sparacio sexually abused her in Arkansas and at a home near Lake Tenkiller.

When Sparacio was questioned about the abuse in Sequoyah County, he told Fuller that he wanted to talk to his lawyer first.

According to Fuller's report, Sparacio is a registered sex offender and has been convicted of felony sex crimes, all after former conviction of a felony.