Amber Richards, described years of manipulation and sexual abuse that began when she was 14.

Testifying during the trial, she recounted waking up to find Richards beside her bed and enduring repeated assaults while pretending to be asleep.

The abuse, she said, escalated after he sent her a message about taking their relationship “to the next level.”

Source: https://thartribune.com/david-lynn-richards-jr-a-former-tennessee-pastor-was-convicted-of-raping-his-adopted-daughter-at-16-after-years-of-abuse-during-her-teens-he-received-a-reduced-sentence-with-the-court-citing-his/

Original post https://www.reddit.com/r/TerrifyingAsFuck/comments/1h90dxs/david_lynn_richards_jr_a_former_tennessee_pastor/

  • Uriel238 [all pronouns]@lemmy.blahaj.zoneEnglish
    33·
    14 days ago

    All the major ministries and megachurches have a youth pastor problem which comes with the territory of having a youth ministry (that councils teens on their life problems).

    Public school teachers and public school guidance counselors have to go through years of training to talk about personal issues and even sometimes share emotional intimacy without it turning into romantic or physical intimacy. And yet we still have the occasional incident in schools where faculty is caught banging a student. (To compare, a 1990s statistic suggested about 33% of psychotherapists are banging one of their clients, but I can’t source the stat.)

    Contrast youth pastors who are untrained volunteers from the parish. Furthermore, most ministries presume their members, being church-going neighbors, don’t need vetting for moral character. According to Redditors who grew up in Southern Baptist youth ministries, the new pastor was the freak of the week since it had turnover like Defense Against Dark Arts.

    Furthermore, their fidelity as a counselor to teen church members is already compromised since they are tasked not just with counseling kids on life stuff, but also to take opportunities to steer them toward devotion to the ministry that is, to find ways to sell them more Jesus. So even some of the well-intended youth ministers are going to find it too tempting to transition from manipulation towards the interests of the church to manipulation to further their own romantic interests.

    But then, those with experience may also recognize it is a safer place for child predators to find new marks, since the ministry will be motivated to silence the victim in order to protect the reputation (now falsely so) of the ministry and the church. This compares to sex scandals in large commercial companies, especially if the aggressor is a high-ranking officer of the company. It becomes too attractive to either pay off the victim or threaten them with blackballing.

  • PyroEnglish
    211·
    14 days ago

    What a fabulous upstanding person. Should have him adopt more kids, surly that would be the best thing

    (I hope the /s is not needed but it’s here)

  • Maggoty@lemmy.worldEnglish
    17·
    14 days ago

    There is no hell deep enough, but this format makes it seem like he got significantly less than the 12 years he did get.

    • FuglyDuck@lemmy.worldEnglish
      6·
      13 days ago

      Compared to the 72 years the prosecutor wanted?

      Yeah. I’m also not seeing if there’s a possibility of parole. So he might only be in for six.

      All those church goers that testified on his behalf… apparently think it’s good and decent, “upstanding” even to rape a child. Constantly.

      • Maggoty@lemmy.worldEnglish
        2·
        13 days ago

        Oh you know he obliterated his own child’s reputation in that church. By the time he was done with them they thought this was some kind of epic battle against the Antichrist.

        As to the sentence length, I’m against extreme sentences for anyone unless you can prove they’re mentally incapable of not re-offending in a violent manner. And in that case they should be in a mental institution, not a prison. 20 years is the most we should be sentencing most people, even hardened criminals tend to get settled by that.

  • Halasham@dormi.zoneEnglish
    12·
    14 days ago

    Ah, yes another example of the exceptional moral fiber of the religious. The higher standard that the religious hold themselves and their leaders to that makes all of us atheists look bad…

    Oh wait that’s never the case. They use their vile faith as a shield from the consequences of their own abhorrent actions. Seriously, can someone differentiate faith and infectious disease for me?