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	Bevel Sentenced to 15 Years for Incest By Erika Jacobson Leesburg Today October 15, 2008 http://www.leesburg2day.com/articles/2008/10/15/news/fp384bevel101508.txt A Circuit Court judge Wednesday upheld the jury-recommended sentence of James L. Bevel, a former top lieutenant to Martin Luther King Jr., who was convicted of incest in April. Judge Burke F. McCahill sentenced Bevel, 71, to 15 years in prison and ordered him to pay a $50,000 fine as well as assorted court costs. Wednesday's sentencing hearing was colored by Bevel's recent diagnosis of end-stage pancreatic cancer, but McCahill said Bevel's health should not play a factor in the way in which he was sentenced. "This trial was not and is not about your health, nor is about your accomplishments in life," McCahill told Bevel. "In reality, this was really only designed to gratify you at the expense of a child." Two weeks ago, Bevel was taken to the emergency room and it was later discovered he had tumors on his pancreas that had also spread to his liver. Testifying Wednesday, Bevel said the doctor had told him he had six weeks to six months to live. Bevel was a civil rights activist who promoted nonviolent action, worked on the Freedom Rides and the voting rights movement in the southern states. He was also an architect of the 1963 march in Washington, DC, and helped organize 1995's Million Man March. Bevel was arrested in June 2007 on the charge that he had sexual intercourse with his daughter, while she was between the ages of 13 and 15. The two were living in an apartment in Leesburg at the time. He later pleaded not guilty. During the trial Bevel also faced accusations of sexual abuse that occurred beginning when his daughter was a young girl. While none of the evidence presented in the case had Bevel explicitly admitting he had sex with his daughter on an unspecified date between October 1992 and October 1994, prosecutors maintained throughout the trial that his statements were enough to infer he had committed incest. Bevel's attorney Bonnie Hoffman called into question the timeline of the events in question, including school records that do not clearly show when his daughter was enrolled in Loudoun County Public Schools. Throughout the trial, Bevel denied that he ever had sexual intercourse with his daughter and maintains that any other sexual activity was part of "scientific experiments" to teach children about sex. While giving his testimony Wednesday, Bevel said he did not believe he had a received a fair trial because the scientific evidence of what he had been working on had not been presented to the court. "I don't think the court and the state worked at getting to the truth of the matter," he said. He added that he believed the commonwealth had worked only to get a conviction, not to find out the truth. Bevel also indicated he would be appeal his conviction based on those grounds. Before imposing his sentence, McCahill said the truth established in the case showed Bevel had abused his position as a religious leader and as a father. When asked by Assistant Commonwealth's Attorney Adriana Eberle if he now took responsibility for his actions against his daughter, Bevel said no, stating, "'I'm sorry' is a game you play." "If I made a mistake, I have to correct that mistake," he said. "I am prepared to do all the work necessary to find the cause of the problem. And anything else is not right." McCahill told Bevel that, if he were to look at the situation through his own beliefs and try to find the cause of the problem, "you would discover that you are the problem." "Look at the conflict in her life," McCahill said of Bevel's daughter. "That is something she will always have to live with." McCahill said it was "troubling' that Bevel did not take the opportunity to find some reconciliation with his family. Throughout the sentencing hearing, reconciliation was a common theme, as the trial has split Bevel's family, which includes 14 children. "I am troubled by your lack of remorse," the judge said. During her own testimony, his daughter said she was most disappointed to see her father lie about what had occurred between them in the 1990s. "I still had a strong faith my father was working on some big truth. Something to bring our family together," she said. "In my wildest dreams I never would have imagined him to lie. He's always been honest." The victim, who was not in the courtroom when McCahill announced the sentence, said Bevel's lies and his inability to acknowledge what he did shattered the last beacon of hope she had for something positive to come out of recent events. "I've always been trying to mend this family," she said. Since the date of the offense in question occurred before Virginia became a no-parole state, Bevel will be eligible for parole. McCahill declined to put any post-release supervision provisions on Bevel's sentenced and ordered Bevel to be kept locally for 14 days to give attorneys the opportunity to work with him on his appeal.
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