Drake Bell, best known for playing Drake on the Nickelodeon TV show Drake and Josh, pleaded not guilty on Thursday to charges related to a girl he met online and who attended a concert of his in 2017 when she was 15.
Bell, 34, was charged with attempted child endangerment, considered a fourth-degree felony, and disseminating matter harmful to juveniles, which is a first-degree misdemeanor, in Cuyahoga County, Ohio.
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The actor and musician is accused of engaging in an inappropriate chat with a young victim that got sexual on Dec. 1, 2017, according to FOX 8 News.
The girl filed a report with her local police department in Canada in October 2018 in connection to the alleged incident, the Cuyahoga County Prosecutor’s Office said. Authorities in Canada contacted police in Cleveland, who conducted an investigation, and court documents show it was Cleveland police who arrested Bell.
Bell and the girl “developed a relationship” online several years earlier, and the actor allegedly sent the girl inappropriate messages through social media in the months leading up to a concert in Cleveland that she attended in December 2017, and there Bell “violated his duty of care and, in doing so, created a risk of harm to the victim,” the prosecutor’s office said.
“All facts will be revealed in a courtroom,” Bell’s attorney Ian Friedman said on Friday, according to the Associated Press.
The actor appeared in court on Thursday, pleaded not guilty, and was freed on a $2,500 personal bond.
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A pretrial Zoom hearing is scheduled for June 23.
