Article: Church elder sentenced to 80 years in prison for sex assaults in Cleburne county

AndersonsInfo

https://www.fox16.com/news/church-elder-sentenced-to-80-years-in-prison-for-sex-assaults-in-cleburne-county/

Church elder sentenced to 80 years in prison for sex assaults in Cleburne county

Posted: Oct 8, 2019 / 05:47 PM CDT / Updated: Oct 8, 2019 / 05:55 PM CDT

CLEBURNE COUNTY, Ark. — A church leader convicted of sexually assaulting children has been sentenced to 80 years in prison.

Roderick Watkins, 57, received the jury’s verdict last week in Cleburne county.

Watkins was an elder in the Jehovah’s Witness church, according to court documents.

Court documents reveal that at least four people came forward over the past year, accusing Watkins of sexually assaulting them while they were children.

The four victims included three boys and one girl.

Cleburne county sheriff, Chris Brown, says six other people came forward as the trial neared, bringing the total number of accusers to 10.

The state prosecuted Watkins on four charges. He received the maximum penalty, 20 years, for each one.

“I think that’s a testament to just how strongly our community feels about things like this,” Brown says.

The crimes happened in various places, including Cleburne county, Batesville and Little Rock, according to victim statements in court documents.

One victim’s mother told detectives she reported the assault to church leaders, and nothing was done at first with the exception of suspension of some of Watkins’ duties, according to court documents.

We reached out to Watkins’ wife and we reached out to his attorney, but both declined to comment.

I think for someone involved in behavior like this, the message should be: when you get caught, not if you get caught, but when you get caught it’s going to be taken seriously,” Brown says.

“Because it’s wrong.”

Vidiot

And the Tide rises another inch.

blondie

As the public and the legal system are getting educated more and more about this problem in the WTS, it will become harder to hide it from the non-jw public, encourage more victims to come forward, and hopefully make more jws wake up to it.

Slidin Fast

One victim’s mother told detectives she reported the assault to church leaders, and nothing was done at first with the exception of suspension of some of Watkins’ duties, according to court documents.

Half banana

One of the key issues is that the Watchtower organisation does not care about the welfare or mental well-being of its members. It never takes serious considered measures to assist the abused, such as paying for professional counselling which is certainly needed in these situations--- it just hopes that the young and innocent victims will keep quiet, suppress the trauma and struggle along by doing the preaching work to take their mind off it.

The purpose of the JW org is to present to the world a squeaky clean Bible based religion doing God's work. This facade they think is attractive to new members.

It is likely the governing body would want to distance themselves from the molesters and claim they were not true members. Alas the molesters, as in the case above, are often "spirit appointed" elders.

The behaviour of the governing body of Jehovah's Witnesses indicates that they are truly narcissistic in believing that they are above the law with their plainly faulty "Bible based" methods of dealing with the serious matter of sexual abuse in their ranks.

Thank goodness that we have a free press in the Western world, whereas the JW org want to hide their misdemeanours it is becoming clear that all of their dirty washing will be aired in a most public way. Their conceit of divine authority to do what they like with people's lives will be shown to be highly irresponsible and that means that the lifeblood of the cult: membership numbers, will plummet.

LV101

Were the victims awarded judgments from cult Watchtower?

LongHairGal

ANDERSONSINFO:

Good. Let the avalanche continue. I hope all the victims come out of the woodwork. Maybe when it gets enough media coverage some of the diehards might wake up. Maybe.

HALF BANANA:

I totally agree with your post. The JW religion only cares about its reputation and not the welfare of the people in it. I think at this point, nobody believes their ‘squeaky clean facade’.

In this day and age, I think people are knowledgeable enough to not believe that any religion or organization is really pristine and unblemished.

Hairtrigger

https://youtu.be/jQ38hvizvmI

Here is a further first hand take on this.

WARNING IT IS a long watch.

Pete Zahut

Watkins is going to have it rough in Prison....I hear even among hardened criminals, a child molester is the worst of the worst.

It makes you wonder what effect this will have on the congregation...will people be leaving in droves. How they explain away the fact that the meetings went on as usual, new members were being baptized yet Jehovah didn't bring this mans wrongdoing to light all these decades. It as only when the victims were old enough to speak for themselves, that this guy was stopped. Why bother praying for Jehovah's help and direction at all?

LV101

I've heard that also about child abusers/pedophiles in prison yrs. ago -- it's sad the WT takes a criminal position against children and the weak, innocent, victims. They are despicable and corrupt -- I don't know what it would take for the cult drugged/indoctrinated members to wake up.

Article: Church elder sentenced to 80 years in prison for sex assaults in Cleburne county

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