Despite the verdict, he was expected to remain in the county jail on a parole hold.
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Ward was the last witness to testify in the one-day trial in Warren County Court.
He was charged with criminal child enticement and aggravated trespassing on Dec. 14 in Springboro.
Diehl asked Ward to describe what it was like living with tattoos framing his face and covering the rest of his head.
“It’s hard to find a job,” Ward said, acknowledging his appearance upset some people he met.
Diehl said Ward let other inmates mark him in prison after his son’s suicide.
With Christmas coming, Ward said, “I was trying to make extra money” when he joined a friend who traveled around the Springboro neighborhood looking for driveways to snow plow.
When the girl answered the door, Ward said he offered to plow the drive and, after she quickly closed the door, walked back to the truck they were traveling in and went on down the street looking for work.
“If they say no, I say, ‘Merry Christmas,’ and go on my way,” he testified.
Assistant County Prosecutor Cynthia Ellison listed Ward’s long criminal history and pressed him about his story, pointing out versions he gave to investigators.
Two Springboro police officers recounted the initial response, as well as interviews with the mother, two girls, Ward and his co-worker, who was not charged.
Earlier in the trial, the 11-year-old and her 7 year-old sister both cried as they testified about the tattoo-faced man who came to the door.
Both spoke so softly they were hard to hear, and the 11-year-old was unable to identify Ward, sitting about 10 feet away at the defense table.
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The 7-year-old looked at Ward as she described, then identified him as the man who tried to lure the 11-year-old out of their Springboro home for a ride in the truck.
The girls’ mother also testified about what Ellison called “every parent’s worst nightmare.”
“She ran into my room sobbing. She was very frightened,” the mother, who is not being named to protect the identity of the children, testified.
In addition to six months in jail on either charge, Ward faced a return to prison for violation of parole.
Diehl sought to convince the jury that the girls were exaggerating what happened when Ward came to the door trying to secure work.
“He was there all day in that neighborhood,” said Diehl, who did the trial as a favor to Public Defender Kelly McKoy, an associate in the Diehl & Hubbell firm. “Some people were scared of him. Some people allowed him to do it.”
Ward was stopped and arrested while still in the neighborhood.
Diehl emphasized that Ward made no attempt to elude police and was plowing a drive down the street from the girls’ home when police arrived.
“Springboro went into a hysteria,” Diehl, a Springboro resident, said during his opening argument.
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Diehl questioned the 7-year-old about what prosecutors told her to say in court.
“To tell the truth and not lie about it,” she said in response to follow-up questions from Ellison.
Over objections from Diehl, Loxley ruled that Ward should stand trial Friday, although a new case was filed, and previous charges were dismissed due to constitutional questions with the original child enticement case brought against Ward.
It was unclear when or how the parole hold would be resolved.
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