By Cheryl Caswell
Charleston Daily Mail
January 27, 2009
http://www.dailymail.com/News/200901260522
CHARLESTON, W.Va. — A teenaged girl testified in court Monday that an adult leader at her church rubbed her in a sexual way and took suggestive photographs of her nearly three years ago.
The teen, now 19, said Timothy C. Edmonds, 37, son-in-law of the pastor of the Chesapeake Apostolic Church, sexually abused her several times in the church basement and at a house nearby that he was remodeling.
Edmonds was arrested two months after the girl's parents notified police that they had found a letter written by their daughter detailing some of the incidents.
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| Timothy Edmonds, a former youth pastor, is accused of sexually abusing a teenage girl Photo by Craig Cunningham |
The teen, who was composed on the witness stand but spoke with a speech impediment, told a jury, "Tim asked if I would help him downstairs in the church. He took me to the little kids room and shut the door."
She said Edmonds "laid me down and got on top of me and he started rubbing his private part against mine."
She said she considered Edmonds a "friend" who often was in his wife's classroom of the church's private school, where she was a student. He also often took part in leading church services there.
She detailed three more incidents where Edmonds lay on her and rubbed her in the church and at a nearby home he was renovating. At the home, she said, he asked her to put on pantyhose and pose for photographs, telling her he was going to enter her in a "great legs contest."
Edmonds has denied all of the charges against him.
"Did you tell anyone what happened?" assistant prosecutor Michelle Drummond asked the teen.
"No," she said.
"Why not?" Drummond asked.
"He told me not to," she said. "He said if I told he would get in trouble and not be able to preach at the church anymore."
Her mother also took the witness stand, telling jurors how she discovered in a pillowcase a letter written by her daughter. In it, she said, the girl spoke of "intimate kissing" with someone named Tim.
When the daughter was questioned, she identified Tim as the church leader. The family spoke to police that night.
Sgt. Larry O'Bryan, who investigated the case, said the letter was written to Edmonds.
O'Bryan said he went to the house where some of the abuse was alleged to have occurred and found couch cushions that matched those described by the girl. He also sent to a state police lab the pantyhose she said she had been wearing.
John Sullivan, Edmond's court-appointed defense attorney, told the jury in his opening statement that the teen had had crushes on other adults before and had written letters to them. One was a teacher at East Bank Middle School, where she attended.
The mother told the jury her adopted daughter was placed in special education classes when she was still in elementary school. She found it harder to adjust socially in middle school and at Riverside High School, she said, and she decided to place her at the private church school in the fall of 2005.
The alleged incidents occurred in March 2006.
Sullivan told the jury the small classroom of about 10-12 students was closely supervised. Video cameras monitored both classroom entrances, he said.
Sullivan also told the jury that the state police bungled the investigation of Edmonds.
Last year, the original case brought by prosecutors against Edmonds was dismissed because of a number of technical errors. But he was re-indicted by a grand jury last fall.
The family settled a civil suit against the church and school last summer for an undisclosed amount.
The trial began Monday in Kanawha Circuit Court before Judge Irene Berger. Testimony was to continue today.
Contact writer Cheryl Caswell at cher@dailymail.com or 304-348-4832.
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