Chris Denman
Ex-Victory Christian Center worker gets 55-year-prison term
http://newsok.com/ex-victory-christian-center-worker-gets-55-year-prison-term/article/3736948/?page=1
TULSA — A former janitor at a Tulsa megachurch engulfed in a sex-abuse
scandal was sentenced to 55 years in prison Wednesday after he pleaded guilty
to raping a 13-year-old girl in the church's stairwell.
Published:
December 12, 2012
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TULSA — A former
janitor at a Tulsa
megachurch engulfed in a sex-abuse scandal was
sentenced to 55 years in prison Wednesday after he pleaded guilty to raping a
13-year-old girl in the church's stairwell.
Denman pleaded guilty in October to first-degree rape, forcible oral sodomy of a child, lewd molestation, making a lewd proposal to a child and two counts of using a computer to facilitate a sex crime.
He did not have a plea agreement with prosecutors and had faced up to life in prison.
Denman was accused in the August rape of a girl on the campus of Victory Christian Center, a worldwide ministry located in south Tulsa that has 17,000 members. Denman was also charged with molesting a 15-year-old girl and making a lewd proposal to a 12-year-old girl.
A second former church employee, Israel Castillo, awaits trial on a charge of making a lewd or indecent proposal to a child. Prosecutors allege that Castillo sent explicit Facebook messages to a 14-year-old girl he had known for at least two years.
Five employees of the church, including the son and daughter-in-law of Victory head pastor Sharon Daugherty, also face misdemeanor charges. They're accused of waiting two weeks to report the alleged rape of the 13-year-old girl by Denman.
John and Charica Daugherty, Paul
Willemstein, Anna George and Harold “Frank” Sullivan have each pleaded not
guilty to a misdemeanor count of failing to report the abuse in a timely manner
and all have a separate hearing scheduled for Wednesday.
In September, after the five church employees were arrested for not reporting the abuse, the ministry issued a statement accepting blame for the delay and vowing to work with the Oklahoma Department of Human Services to audit its reporting policy.