The case against a New Jersey ex-convict found with Rosie O’Donnell’s missing teenage daughter three years ago has been dismissed.
Court records indicate charges of child endangerment and distributing obscenity to a minor against 28-year-old Steven Sheerer were dropped last month.
Defense attorney Robert Tarver said on Monday he was unaware the case had been thrown out. He said prosecutors were pushing for a guilty plea earlier this year.
Case closed: The case against Steven Sheerer, 28 (left), who was found with Rosie O’Donnell’s missing daughter Chelsea (pictured together, right), in August 2015 has been dismissed
Chelsea was reported missing in August 2015 by her mother and later found at Sheerer’s home in Barnegat, New Jersey (above)
A tweet sent by The View co-host in August 2015 update her followers about her daughter
The former co-host of The View reported 17-year-old Chelsea missing from her New York home four days before she was found in the attic of Sheerer’s home in Barnegat, New Jersey, in August 2015.
Tarver had said evidence would show his client was not guilty, reported Asbury Park Press.
Chelsea previously told DailyMail.com that her adoptive mother Rosie had kicked her out of their South Nyack, New York, home before her 18th birthday and denied the comedian’s claims that she was mentally ill.
Chelsea was located about a week after her disappearance in New Jersey with Sheerer, then aged 25, whom she had met on Tinder. She was found hiding in the attic with her therapy dog named Bear.
Past misdeeds: Sheerer (left and right) had been convicted of possessing controlled dangerous substances and child endangerment
New life: Chelsea revealed that she secretly married her boyfriend, Nick Alliegro, 31, in July 2016 after she found out she was expecting her first child
Sheerer had been convicted of possessing controlled dangerous substances and child endangerment after a 2013 incident in which he was arrested with heroin and marijuana while in a car with a woman and her two children, aged one and three.
He pleaded guilty and was sentenced to two years’ probation.
Sheerer was charged with endangering the welfare of a child in Chelsea’s disappearance and third-degree distribution of obscenity to a minor. The latter was the result of a nude photo Sheerer sent the teen on Tinder when she was underage.
During a court hearing in September 2015, Chelsea admitted that she misrepresented her age to Sheerer on Tinder.
Chelsea has been estranged from Rosie, who adopted her as a baby in 1997, for the past three years.
In an exclusive interview with DailyMail.com last year, Chelsea revealed that she secretly married her boyfriend, Nick Alliegro, 31, in July 2016 after she found out she was expecting her first child, but the pregnancy ended in a miscarriage.
Rosie O’Donnell poses at the opening night of the play Children of a Lesser God on Broadway at Studio 54 on April 11 in New York City