PORTLAND, Ore. — Editor's note: The video above aired before police announced the arrest and identity of the suspect.
Portland police have arrested a man accused of groping a child at a Fred Meyer grocery store last month. The Portland Police Bureau (PPB) confirmed the arrest in a news release at around 9:45 p.m. Tuesday, only hours after the bureau had released surveillance photos of the suspect and asked the public to help identify him.
Adam M. Caldwell, 42, of Portland was arrested near the area of Southeast 52nd Avenue and Southeast Duke Street after a community member called 911 at around 7:30 p.m. to report his location. He was booked in Multnomah County jail on a charge of third-degree sex abuse.
Central precinct officers were called to the Fred Meyer at the intersection of Southeast Hawthorne Boulevard and Southeast Cesar E. Chavez Boulevard on June 20 on a report of sexual abuse, according to the Portland Police Bureau. After arriving, they determined that an adult man inappropriately touched a 10-year-old girl and then ran away.
According to police, a father and his two daughters were shopping at the store that evening and the two girls went off to get some caramel for desert. Moments later, the father heard one of the girls scream and saw them running towards him. When he asked what happened, one of them said a stranger had grabbed her buttocks.
Anyone with information about the case is asked to contact PPB Neighborhood Response Team Investigator Joseph Bernard at joseph.bernard@police.portlandoregon.gov or Officer Richard Brahy at richard.brahy@police.portlandoregon.gov and reference case number 24-152472.