Diaper man pleads guilty to fraud

A 40-year-old man who tricked caregivers into changing his diapers by pretending he had the emotional maturity of a 5-year-old apologized to a victim in court Monday before pleading guilty to charges of organized fraud. Authorities said Sean Kelly of Port St. John told caregivers he was incontinent and hired two women to change his diapers in 2008 and 2009 but did not pay them the amount he promised.

He was officially charged with two counts of organized fraud of less than $20,000 by the Brevard State Attorney's office in February. Kelly, 40, was sentenced to a year of house arrest and four years of probation on Monday. Judge Robert Wohn also ordered a psychological evaluation of Kelly. "An apology might not be enough," Kelly told a victim in court. But ". . . for my part, I apologize." Minutes earlier, the caregiver had tearfully described how she changed Kelly's diaper and fed and bathed him.



"I have to live with this for the rest of my life, this shame," she said. Prosecutor Don Loughran said Kelly likely had other victims. "I think they are too embarrassed to come forward," he said. "What this man did was despicable." According to the Brevard County Sheriff's Office, Kelly sometimes would hire women through postings on Craigslist.org. He would call them pretending to be the brother of the disabled man who needed care.

Kelly would then show up and pretend to be the man with the disability. The ruse was exposed when a caregiver's husband saw him get into a car and drive off. Lt. Tod Goodyear, who heads the sex crimes unit of the sheriff's office, said he believed Kelly had a fetish where adults want to be fed from bottles and wear diapers. "Online, we have found, there are groups that cater to this kind of fetish," Goodyear said.