By NEAL WAGNER / Managing Editor

BAY MINETTE – A former Birmingham police officer and Alabaster resident who is facing several sex charges in Shelby County is now facing a new child sex abuse charge in south Alabama after he was indicted on the charge in early October.

A Baldwin County grand jury during its August session indicted 30-year-old Pleasant Grove resident Joshua Richard Herbinger on one count of sexual abuse of a child younger than 12. The charge allegedly was related to an incident in Orange Beach, according to his indictment, which listed no offense date.

Herbinger, who previously listed an address in Alabaster, also currently is facing four felony counts of sexual abuse of a child younger than 12 and one felony count of first-degree rape in Shelby County.

Shelby County District Court Judge Dan Reeves bound charges against Herbinger over to the grand jury on Aug. 26, and the grand jury returned indictments against the suspect on Sept. 10. He was scheduled to appear in Shelby County Circuit Court on Oct. 5 at 8:30 a.m. for arraignment.

Herbinger had been a Birmingham police officer for about nine years before he was terminated from the position on Oct. 24, 2014.

The Shelby County charges came after the Alabaster Police Department arrested Herbinger on Oct. 20, 2014, and charged him with the first-degree rape charge after an alleged incident involving an adult victim, according to Alabaster Police Chief Curtis Rigney.

When he was arrested on Oct. 20, 2014, he was out on bond for four counts of sexual abuse of a child younger than 12, which were brought against him by Alabaster police on Oct. 9, 2014.

According to Alabaster Police Chief Curtis Rigney, the child sex abuse charges came after a female student in Alabaster notified her school resource officer of the allegations. The Shelby County charges and the Baldwin County charges involve the same underage victim.

Herbinger was released from the Baldwin County Jail on Oct. 2 after his attorney filed a motion to allow the suspect to return home to his residence in Pleasant Grove. As of Oct. 5, Herbinger was under house arrest in Pleasant Grove awaiting future court hearings.