AUBURN — A Lewiston man who gained brief infamy when he falsely accused a well-known Syracuse basketball coach of molesting him and was later convicted of sexually assaulting a 13-year-old boy is back in jail.

This time, a probation officer says Zachary Tomaselli, 27, of 341 Sabattus St., violated the terms of his probation by stealing his grandmother’s flat-screen TV and iPad from her College Street home in Lewiston.

Probation Officer Jason Taylor wrote in an affidavit that Tomaselli admitted stealing his grandmother’s electronics after initially claiming to have been at work at the time they disappeared on Nov. 17. When Taylor checked with the oil company where Tomaselli had claimed to have been working, Taylor was told that Tomaselli never worked there.

He also lied to his grandmother about needing money to register as a sex offender with the Lewiston Police Department every three months, Taylor wrote.

When he was told to wait for a drug test at the probation office, Tomaselli fled. When he later turned himself in to his probation officer, he said he would have failed the test because he had taken heroin, crack and THC a day earlier.

During a car ride to Androscoggin County Jail, he admitted that he had broken into his grandmother’s home and stolen her TV and iPad to exchange for drugs with a dealer.

“Tomaselli stated he was cooperating because he did not want his grandmother worrying that some stranger was going to break into her house and he did not want her to be scared when it was him that did it,” Taylor wrote.

As of Thursday, Tomaselli was held without bail pending a probation revocation hearing scheduled for Dec. 29.

The Androscoggin County District Attorney’s Office said it had no new criminal complaints pending against Tomaselli, nor did the 8th District Court.

In April 2012, Tomaselli was sentenced in Androscoggin County Superior Court to 12 years in prison with all but three years and three months suspended. He started serving six years of probation in February.

Tomaselli had pleaded guilty in December 2011 to gross sexual assault and unlawful sexual contact, both felonies, as well as to two misdemeanor charges of visual sexual aggression against a child.

Terms of his probation included no contact with children under age 18, no contact with the victim or his family and required sex-offender counseling. He was barred from having or drinking alcohol and was required to take all of his prescribed medications and not to use illegal drugs.

The sexual abuse charges stemmed from incidents that began in August 2009 when Tomaselli met his victim at a day camp where Tomaselli worked as a counselor. The crimes occurred later, not at the camp. The boy was 13 when the abuse started, and turned 14 when the abuse continued.

Tomaselli went public with his own sexual abuse allegations, along with two other accusers, against former Syracuse associate head coach Bernie Fine, who, Tomaselli said, molested him in 2002 when he was 13 years old. The U.S. Attorney’s Office investigated. Tomaselli’s was the only claim that hadn’t expired by statute. No charges were brought in that case. Fine was fired from his position at Syracuse. Tomaselli sued Fine but later dropped the suit.

The same week Tomaselli was sentenced, he admitted to having fabricated the accusations against Fine.

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