A twelve-year-old girl who dropped her headphones getting off a public bus could not have known that the driver’s offer to help her find them would lead to her being driven down a side road and sexually assaulted.

That is what a jury accepted this week when they found bus operator Kenroy Graham guilty of indecent assault, rejecting his claim that the whole thing was a setup designed to run him off his bus route.

The incident happened on April 1st, 2022. The girl had boarded Graham’s bus at the West Bus Station heading to Coolidge. When she got off at her stop she bumped her head and lost her headphones in the process. Graham told her she could stay on and look for them after he dropped off his remaining passengers. She agreed.

Once the last passenger was gone, Graham did not return to his normal route. He turned down a side road, stopped the bus, and approached the girl. He asked her about her age and where she lived. He rubbed her upper thigh. He told her he wanted her to be his girlfriend and asked to perform oral sex on her.

She told him she needed to go home. As she was leaving the bus, he asked her to keep quiet about what had happened. She ran home and told her aunt immediately. Police were contacted that same day.

At trial Graham denied everything, claiming from the dock — where he could not be questioned — that someone was trying to take his bus route and had used the child to set him up. He named no one and offered no evidence to support the claim.

The jury did not believe him. Graham was remanded after the verdict and returns to court on March 31st for sentencing.