Former Youth Pastor Sentenced to 15 Years in Prison Despite Emotional Plea

Des Moines Register
March 24, 2014

http://www.desmoinesregister.com/article/20140324/NEWS01/303240071/Former-youth-pastor-sentenced-15-years-prison-despite-emotional-plea

Former Des Moines youth pastor Ryan McKelvey and his attorney, Keith Rigg, asked a Polk County District Court judge to suspend his prison sentence at this morning's sentencing. / Andrea Melendez/The Register

A former Des Moines youth pastor who pleaded guilty to sex abuse was sentenced to 15 years in prison this morning, despite his emotional pleas for the judge to suspend his sentence.

Polk County District Court Judge Karen Romano gave Ryan Matthew McKelvey, 27, the sentence this morning after telling him that she believed he was a “predator” who used his status in a Des Moines church to abuse two teenage females.

McKelvey was a youth pastor at the Heritage Assembly Church, 5051 N.E. Fifth St., until he lost his job sometime last summer. Church leaders had become aware that McKelvey had violated church policy by being alone with female juveniles, according to a statement from the church last year.

In August, a 16-year-old girl reported to police that she’d kissed McKelvey and that he made her touch his genitals, according to court papers. Through their investigation, police found another teenage female who also reported abuse.

Both females and their mothers spoke at the sentencing hearing this morning, describing how McKelvey became close friends with the families of the females he abused. A mother of one of the females told the judge how McKelvey had been invited to family events such as birthday parties and he took a trip to Adventureland Amusement Park with the family.

The mother also said her daughter confided in McKelvey about her poor relationship with her biological father. McKelvey told the mother that he could be a “father figure” to her daughter, the mother said.

“I remember thinking, if you can’t trust a youth pastor, who can you trust,” she said. “All those fun times are completely overshadowed by the fact that he was molesting my daughter.”

In June, when the youth pastor’s wife was in labor delivering the family’s child, McKelvey snuck over to the family’s house at 4 a.m. to see the teenager, the mother said. The Des Moines Register regularly does not identify victims of sexual abuse.

McKelvey pleaded guilty last month to one count of third-degree sexual abuse and two counts of sexual exploitation by a counselor or clergy. The former youth pastor faced up to 20 years in prison, but Romano chose to allow to of the charges stemming from the same victim to run concurrently.

Keith McKelvey – Ryan McKelvey’s father – and his longtime pastor from a Dayton, Ohio church last month wrote letters to Romano asking for McKelvey’s sentence to be suspended so he could return home to Ohio for parole. At home, Ryan McKelvey would undergo professional counseling, as well as counseling through the church, his father and pastor wrote.

The victims and their mothers, however, disagreed this morning. Ryan McKelvey needs to be in a prison to properly take advantage of sex offender treatment options, said one of the girls McKelvey abused.

“You honor, truthfully, the thought of Ryan being out and free and being able to roam the streets, it makes me physically ill,” one of the females said. “I personally don’t feel as if probation is a punishment…What is the point of me speaking up and saying what this man did to me when he just gets to walk away like nothing ever happened. ”

In his own plea to the judge, McKelvey said that his career in ministry is over, but he hopes to eventually return to school to study business or law. McKelvey’s wife has filed for divorce and being out of prison and finding a job would allow him to help pay for the divorce as well as legal costs and restitution to his victims, he said.

While the victims and their mothers told the judge that McKelvey’s actions clearly showed he “manipulated” the teenagers, the former youth pastor said he shouldn’t be considered a “predator.” McKelvey said he’d “never re-offend” and was excited to learn about treatment opportunities outside of prison.

“I want to say to the victims and their families, that I 100 percent regret being vulnerable and allowing their vulnerabilities in my life to act in this way,” he said. “I hate what I did, I hate the situations that I was in, I hate how I used pain and hard times to rationalize and justify my actions.”

In issuing the sentence, Romano noted that McKelvey has no criminal history and family members in Ohio who are willing to help him if he were released on probation. However, McKelvey clearly used his role as a youth pastor to abuse the females, she said.

“I find that your statement that you are not a manipulator or a predator just grossly…misidentifies what has happened here,” she said. “That is exactly what you are, you are a manipulator.”