CLEARFIELD — The trial for an Osceola Mills man accused of soliciting inappropriate photos from juvenile girls ended in a mistrial Monday morning in Clearfield County Court.

Police were contacted in July by members of a child predator exploitation organization who had been texting with Reed Eugene Meeker, 39. He believed they were young girls.

They provided investigators with multiple text conversations during which Meeker described sexual acts he wanted to perform on the girls and asked for photos of the two doing sexual things to each other.

During the chat, Meeker’s face and penis were reportedly visible.

Prior to the trial, Meeker who waived his right to counsel filed several motions himself asking that both Judge Paul Cherry and District Attorney Ryan Sayers to be removed from the case.

Both were denied.

Another motion filed by Meeker stated that he didn’t want any standby counsel.

But when time came for him to do his opening statements, at the beginning of the trial, Meeker asked for an attorney to act as standby counsel.

The jury was removed from the courtroom to further discuss the issue.

When Cherry reminded him that only last Tuesday he said he didn’t want any standby counsel, Meeker said he meant he didn’t want anyone from the public defender’s office.

“I did not pass the bar exam so I can’t legally represent myself,” he stated and then asked again for an attorney.

Cherry said because he never received a motion from Meeker asking for other counsel, the trial would proceed and the jury was brought back in.

Again Meeker said he would not do any opening statements without standby counsel.

“Show me something that says I can’t have standby counsel.”

The jury was again removed from the room.

Cherry asked Meeker why he didn’t want either of the two lawyers from the public defender’s office to work with him. Meeker said because one of them didn’t want to help him, but only wanted to help the commonwealth and the other didn’t know anything about the case.

Sayers commented that Meeker clearly stated he didn’t want counsel last week and was clearly “playing games.” He asked Cherry to make sure the jury understands that Meeker’s rights to an attorney were not being violated.

After more discussion, Meeker said he wanted to hire private counsel, and Cherry eventually declared a mistrial and dismissed the jury. He set the date for jury selection as April 6 and said there will be no further continuances. If Meeker wants standby counsel and doesn’t hire one, an attorney will be picked for him.

According to the affidavit of probable cause, in an interview with investigators, Meeker reportedly admitted to soliciting photographs from two females he believed were under the age of 12.

Meeker is charged with one felony count of criminal solicitation-child pornography. His bail is $150,000.

Online court records show that Meeker pleaded guilty to sexual assault, aggravated indecent assault, two counts of indecent assault and two counts of corruption of minors in Centre County in 2005.

It was at that time he was determined to be a sexually violent predator.