Black Collar Sex Crime Round-Up: September 16, 2009
Patrick O’Connor • Joshua Spires • Scott Dewayne Wright
Because we could spend 24/7 tracking the sex crimes of right-wing religionists (especially “youth pastors”) and never get caught up. Of the following, the more interesting cases will probably end up with their very own Conservative Babylon entries.
Arrested: Hence Hamblin, Jr., 66, who in August resigned as pastor of the West Middletown Church of God, Madison Township, Ohio, for “for allegedly inappropriately touching an underage female,” and charged with one count of gross sexual imposition, a fourth-degree felony. Free on bail; scheduled for preliminary hearing September 17, 2009. Story: Middletown Journal, September 12, 2009
Charged: Steven Bruce Joplin, 59, director of Christian education, Christ United Methodist Church, Staunton, Virginia, with seven counts (and counting) of aggravated sexual battery of a minor under 13 years old — specifically, a ten-year-old girl. He’s facing charges involving at least four more victims, ranging in ages from 10 to 12. Story: NewsVirginian.com
Arrested: Joshua O’Bannion, 25, intern, Christ Life Church, Tempe, Arizona, on three counts of sex abuse and eight counts of sexual misconduct with a minor, after allegedly having sex with a 14-year-old girl. O’Bannion now lives in Ohio. Story: ABC15.com, September 15, 2009
Pled: Patrick O’Connor, 51, former Catholic priest, St. Jude Church, Elyria, Ohio, and former Elyria police chaplain, not guilty to one count of sexual battery after being accused of having sexual contact with a teenage boy during the summer of 1997. O’Connor, reports the Chronicle-Telegram, resigned in June 2008 after the latest allegation against him surfaced when the victim in the case, who wasn’t a parishioner, came forward to the Catholic Diocese of Cleveland. … O’Connor previously had been suspended as a priest between 2003 and 2007 while the church was investigating another sexual abuse allegation…” O’Connor is currently free on bond.
Charged: Joshua Spires, 28, former senior pastor, First Baptist Church of Jay, Oklahoma, with 10 counts of lewd molestation on a 15-year-old girl from his church. As of this writing, in jail pending a $100,000 bond; next court date slated for September 29, 2009. Spires is married, and the father of a boy, 7, and a daughter not yet two. Spires could get as much as 200 years in prison. Story: Tulsa World, August 26, 2009
Sentenced: Scott Dewayne Wright, 35, husband, father of four, and youth pastor, Calvary Chapel Worship Center, New Port Richey, Florida, to more 49-1/2 years in prison, plus six years’ probation and attendance in a sex-offender treatment program, after pleading guilty to “two counts of unlawful sexual activity with a 16-year-old girl in her Palm Harbor home.” Noted the Tampa Bay Times: “In a 2005 St. Petersburg Times article about a youth group event, Wright was quoted as saying teens needed to stop using gossip, profanity and sexual comments. ‘We need to change what’s cool and what’s not’…”
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