Local neurologist with criminal history dies

Staff report

BOARDMAN

An area doctor arrested last April and accused of exposing himself to school children has died.

Dr. Robert Brocker, 65, was found dead about 4:50 p.m. Saturday by his wife in their Hitchcock Road home, according to a police report.

Reports said his wife told police she tried to wake him up but he was nonresponsive and cold to the touch.

The Mahoning County Coroner’s Office will conduct an autopsy to determine the cause of death.

In May, Youngstown police arrested Brocker on two counts of public indecency.

Police were called April 18 to Catalina and Margaret avenues on the North Side, where a 15-year-old girl told them a man had come to the corner several times since school began in September and he would pull his pants down and expose his genitals.

As police were on the scene, a car appeared that the witness said was driven by the man who had exposed himself. Police pulled it over, and Brocker was driving, reports said.

The case was set for an April 29 jury trial.

In 2008, court records show Brocker was charged in Mahoning County Area Court in Canfield with obstructing official business for an incident involving Canfield police in September 2007. The case was later dismissed, but there was no explanation given in court records for the dismissal.

Brocker also was arrested in 2005 on domestic-violence charges in Canfield.

His wife told police she confronted him for drinking, and he grabbed her and threw her to the ground.

Police took three handguns from Brocker’s truck and four rifles from his home. They also confiscated a bag of ammunition.

At the request of his wife, the case was dismissed.