Police: Muncie man bit, burned girlfriend

• A Muncie man is accused of battering and otherwise abusing his girlfriend over a 3-month period.
• City police said the alleged victim had bite wounds, and a neck burn inflicted with a cigarette.
• Eric Vorhees was preliminarily charged with battery and criminal confinement, among other charges.

MUNCIE – A Muncie man has been accused of beating and torturing his girlfriend — leaving her with bite wounds and burns, among other injuries — over a period of three months.

Eric Harrold Vorhees, 21, was arrested Friday night on preliminary charges of criminal confinement, battery resulting in moderate bodily injury, domestic battery and public intoxication.

Early Friday evening, police were sent to a South Tillotson Avenue restaurant, where Vorhees' alleged victim asked an officer to accompany her to the westside apartment she shared with Vorhees so she could retrieve a credit card.

"I saw that her arms were covered in bruises," the officer wrote in an affidavit. "I then saw how one bruise had teeth marks and that she had an open wound on the left side of her neck."

The woman said Vorhees had been abusing her daily since they moved from Colorado to Muncie about three months ago.

The neck wound was the result of being burned with a cigarette, she said, adding she had bruises all over her body, including another bite wound on her right leg. The alleged victim also said Vorhees controlled all of the money she made working at a local restaurant, and had threatened her with a knife.

Vorhees was then arrested at the couple's apartment, in the 700 block of South Brittain Avenue. His blood-alcohol level was measured at 0.23 percent, nearly three times the legal limit for motorists in Indiana. He remained in the Delaware County jail on Monday under a $13,500 bond.

Asked later by police if she wanted to retrieve personal belongings from the apartment, the alleged victim said, ""I don't know. I'm not used to making decisions."

City police said there was a warrant for Vorhees' arrest in Colorado charging him with domestic battery. However, authorities in the Centennial State said they did not intend to pursue extradition from Indiana.

Contact news reporter Douglas Walker at (765) 213-5851. You can also follow him on Twitter @DouglasWalkerSP.