COURTLAND—Two trial dates have been set in Southampton County Circuit Court for a Suffolk man charged with 19 counts of sexually abusing minors.

Thirty-five-year-old Carlton Kearney of Lake Speight Drive in Suffolk faces three charges of carnal knowledge of a child, four charges of animate object sexual penetration, six charges of taking indecent liberties with a child, three charges of aggravated sexual battery and three charges of forcible sodomy.

The first trial date has been set for Dec. 16, and the second for Jan. 13, according to Commonwealth’s Attorney Eric Cooke, who is prosecuting the case.

Sources said that Kearney knew both of his alleged victims, who are both females and were 12 and 13 years old at the time the incidents began in 1997. The abuse allegedly occurred intermittently through the year 2001 in the City of Franklin.

Franklin Police Lt. T.W. Whitt, a spokesman for his department, said investigators originally were alerted to the possibility of sexual abuse against the two girls in February 2007. Kearney was arrested on one set of charges last June. More charges were lodged against him the following month.

The court appointed attorney Steven Plott of Portsmouth to represent Kearney.