Cadillac Ranch owner charged with child molestation

LUBBOCK, Texas (AP) - An arrest warrant was issued Wednesday for Amarillo millionaire and eccentric artist Stanley Marsh 3, who is being charged with 11 felony counts of child molestation.

Special prosecutor Matt Powell said Marsh faces six counts of child sexual assault and five counts of sexual performance by a child that involve two alleged victims. He said he did not know whether Marsh had been taken into custody.

"This is the beginning of the process," Powell said. "This is what we felt like we needed to do."

He said the charges against Marsh could go before a grand jury in the next few weeks or soon after the first of the year.

Several lawsuits filed in the past few months claimed that Marsh paid at several teenage boys ranging in age from 15 to 16 for sexual acts. The teens weren't named in the suits. One said Marsh gave him drugs and alcohol.

Marsh is probably best known for planting 10 brightly painted Cadillacs nose down along a Panhandle highway in the 1970s.

His attorney, Kelly Utsinger, did not immediately return a call seeking comment.

Marsh, 74, is an Amarillo native and philanthropist who along with his wife has donated to local art and education causes. After he suffered a series of strokes, his wife was appointed his guardian.

Marsh was indicted on charges of indecency with a child in 1996, but the charges were eventually dismissed. That same year Marsh acknowledged no wrongdoing in a settlement with a youth who claimed Marsh sexually abused him.