By Eric Glasser
WPTV
January 8, 2010
http://www.wptv.com/content/news/southpbc/boyntonbeach/story/pastor-sexual-battery-arrested-dieugrand-jacques/9mqfAKs6REW8dNsNUjHNfQ.cspx
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| Dieugrand Jacques (PBSO ) |
BOYNTON BEACH, FL-- A Boynton Beach pastor has been arrested for sexual battery on a teenaged girl.
The case dates back to May of 2007 when the alleged victim would have been just 15 years old. But she didn't tell police about it until more than a year later - August of 2008.
The case was filed about a year ago and a warrant was issued about a month ago.
Why it took so long to process remains unclear but the suspect was arrested Thursday night.
He is 39-year-old Dieugrand Jacques, the pastor at the New Alliance Haitian Church in Boynton Beach.
His young accuser says Jacques used his position of authority to win her trust and brought her to his home in May 2007.
"I know my husband is innocent," said Yrose Jacques in front of the couple's Suburban Lake Worth home. Yrose and Dieugrand have four young children of their own.
"I don't believe it because I know my husband is against child molestation. " she says, "It is ridiculous."
During what was supposed to be a counseling session, Jacques’ accuser says the pastor asked her about sexual relations with her boyfriend, kissed her and then fondled her vagina.
The alleged victim says pastor Jacques told her, "Don't worry..I do this to all my girls."
That alarmed investigators who questioned other women in the church. One, according to the police, said there was no way the pastor would do such a thing. But another said something similar had happened to her.
The state attorney's office declined to issue a warrant in that case saying too much time had gone by to corroborate the story.
For his part, pastor Jacques denies any inappropriate contact has ever taken place, and claims his young accuser fabricated the story to get her boyfriend away from the church.
Yvrose Jacques says her husband was being held on a $7,500 bond, but when he was released from jail, vowed he would return to the pulpit at his church.
"There's nothing I can do," she says. "I just leave everything in God's hands. That's all."
Contact: eglasser@wptv.com
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