WICHITA, Kansas – Louie, the Joyland Clown mascot, was found in a sex offender's home.  Louie went missing more than a decade ago.
Wichita Police Department Detective Matt Lang said a phone tip led to the discovery.
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Louie disappeared from the Joyland property in 2005 or 2006 but wasn't reported stolen until 2010. Louie playedÂ
Joyland's Wurlitzer organ
(see video below).
The Wichita Police Department will pursue charges against two suspects in the case.
Wichita police say officers found the clown Tuesday at a home of 39-year-old Damian Mayes, who is serving a prison sentence for a 2010 conviction for aggravated indecent liberties with a child and aggravated criminal sodomy. Mayes used to build and repair organs at the park. He's in
prison on child sex crimes
.
Det. Lang says he has only been working the case about a month when the tip came in. He says he remembered the clown from his childhood.
"There was a lot of interest not only in Joyland, but the clown in particular kinda kept it alive, I din't know a whole lot about it and had to do some research myself, and I didn't realize there was such an interest," said Det. Lang.
Police say that the nearly 50-year-old clown is worth $10,000.
Joyland in Wichita was open for 55 years until 2004.  It closed and briefly reopened.