OCEAN CITY — A local man was arrested on indecent exposure and disorderly conduct charges last weekend after a mid-day series of disturbing events.
Around noon last Friday, Ocean City Police Department (OCPD) officers were dispatched to an uptown shopping center at 118th Street for a reportedly naked and disorderly male in the parking lot. An employee of a massage business had called police and reported the male, later identified as Willard Sharp, 65, of Ocean City, had been acting erratically and had taken off his clothes.
When OCPD officers arrived, they found Sharp sitting on a picnic table in front of a restaurant wearing a brown jacket but no pants, which were later found balled up on the ground near him. According to police reports, Sharp was facing the storefront window of the restaurant and had his hand moving around in his lap. There were around 20 customer vehicles parked in the immediate area when the officers arrived, according to police reports.
OCPD officers approached Sharp and instructed him to put his pants on, a task he struggled with, according to police reports. Once his pants were secured, Sharp was taken into custody. Once Sharp was in custody, the officers noticed he had a red liquid running down his chin and the front of his shirt.
When the officers asked if Sharp was bleeding or if he had been drinking something red, Sharp reportedly admitted he had been drinking. According to police reports, there were five empty or partially filled red wine bottles in the garden near Sharp’s location along with an unopened red wine bottle in his jacket pocket.
OCPD officers interviewed the original complainant, who advised she had first noticed Sharp sleeping on the picnic table when she arrived for work around 9:45 a.m. The complainant said she recognized Sharp from previous attempts he had made at her business to get sexual favors during massages. The witness told police around 11 a.m., she noticed Sharp was sitting up and moving around. It was about that time Sharp allegedly took his pants off and he reportedly stood in front of her business while exposed.
The witness said Sharp then squatted down and appeared to defecate near the restaurant adjacent to her business. While Sharp was being taken into custody, he remained uncooperative and yelled at citizens passing by in the shopping center and demanded they come back and apologize to him. He was ultimately charged with indecent exposure, disorderly conduct and littering.
