By Peggy Lee
WJZ
July 26, 2007
http://wjz.com/topstories/local_story_207161007.html
(WJZ) Ellicott City, Md. A sentence was handed down for a local pastor after being convicted of molesting a teenage parishioner.
Peggy Lee reports dozens of parishioners came out to support the pastor. When the judge handed down the sentence of 15 years in prison, they erupted in hysterics.
Somber-faced parishioners from the Redemption Christian Fellowship Church in Baltimore County filed out of the Howard County Circuit Court moments after learning their pastor's fate.
Gerald Griffith, 41, was sentenced Thursday on two counts of sexual abuse of a minor. The judge gave him 15 years in prison.
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Griffith, known as the 'Apostle' to his followers, was arrested by Baltimore County police in November 2005 after five young church members say Griffith molested them during counseling sessions at the Woodlawn church.
He was convicted this May in Howard County for also abusing one of those youths, a teenage boy, at hotels in Columbia in 2004 and 2005.
"You had a victim who was brave enough to come forward with the truth, even though that meant standing up to someone who was so popular and well respected. The truth was told, the truth was believed and justice was served," said prosecutor Lisa Broten.
Griffith's victim told the judge, "Griffith was a holy man, a man I looked up to, a man who told me he would be a father figure and then manipulated me."
"What is done in the dark will sure come out in the light. It might take awhile, but eventually it will come out. You can hide all you want, but just like they always say, skeletons in their closet. They always come out," said Ellen Newman, the victim's friend.
Pastor Griffith wept as he addressed the court moments before sentencing, sometimes even directing comments to his victim.
He told the judge, "I've spent my life saving the lives of others and somehow today I've lost my life."
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