An angry father pummeled a would-be burglar accused of molesting a 3-year-old girl.

St. George police said late Saturday night a woman took her daughter inside their home to go to the bathroom.

"She goes back to check on her daughter and notices the door is locked," St. George Police Sgt. Craig Harding said Monday. "She tries it for a few minutes and finally the door is unlocked. She goes in and sees her daughter is completely naked. She looks in the mirror and sees a man hiding behind the door and she screams."

The woman's husband came rushing in and dragged the man out of the home into the front yard. Police said the 3-year-old then revealed the man had taken her clothes off and molested her.

"The mother runs out and tells her husband, who starts to beat him until officers arrived," Harding said.

Police said the man fought with officers as he was being placed in handcuffs. He was taken to Dixie Regional Medical Center to be treated for the beating he received.

Eugenio Vichi Tapia, 29, was booked into the Purgatory Jail for investigation of aggravated sex abuse, burglary, intoxication and interfering with an arrest. An immigration hold also was placed on the man, police said.

A jail booking mug shot shows the man with a big black eye, a swollen jaw and a number of cuts and bruises on his face.

Police believe the intruder had walked through an open door in the home intending to burglarize the place. When he saw the girl, his motives apparently changed, Harding says.

"I can certainly understand the dad and his emotional reaction," Harding said. "But people need to not take the law into their own hands."

The father of the child was not cited.

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