By NEAL WAGNER / Managing Editor

COLUMBIANA – A 60-year-old Alabaster man who is facing a felony child abuse charge has been released from the Shelby County Jail after his bond was revoked last year because of a drunken driving charge, and he is now set to appear in Shelby County Circuit Court for a hearing in May.

Percy Nelms, who lists an address on Mount Olive Road, is scheduled to appear in court for a preliminary hearing in front of Judge William Bostick on May 6, according to scheduling documents filed in court recently.

The Columbiana Police Department arrested Nelms on July 21, 2015, and charged him with one felony count of child abuse.

Nelms’ arrest came after he was indicted by a Shelby County grand jury in November 2015.

His indictment claimed he “did on or about July 16, 2015, torture, willfully abuse, cruelly beat or otherwise willfully maltreat” a male child by “hitting him about the face and body with fists and/or slapping him about his head and body and/or hitting him about his body with a belt.”

Child abuse is a Class C felony, and is punishable by up to 10 years in prison upon conviction. Nelms was released from the Shelby County Jail the same day he was arrested after posting a $20,000 bond, according to jail records.

While Nelms was out on bond for the child abuse charge, he was arrested by the Alabaster Police Department on a drunken driving charge on Feb. 1, 2018, prompting the Shelby County District Attorney’s Office to request Nelms’ bond be revoked because “one of the mandatory conditions of release on bond is that defendant refrain from committing any new criminal offenses.”

In mid-November 2018, Nelms was released from the Shelby County Jail on a pre-trial release bond program, which stipulated he hold a full-time job or attend school full-time while awaiting his trial. The release agreement also requires he submit to and pass random drug tests and report to a pre-trial officer twice per month.