FLORIDA
Tampa Bay Times
TAMPA — A youth pastor at Openwater Church in Odessa was arrested Saturday and charged with sexual battery on a juvenile, according to the Hillsborough County Sheriff’s Office.
Samuel Armand Sutter, 26, of Tampa faces five counts of lewd and lascivious behavior with a victim aged 12 to 16, and five counts of sexual battery.
Sutter “began a sexual relationship” with a girl who attends Openwater Church in October 2015, deputies said in a news release. Their relationship “escalated to numerous sexual encounters,” mostly at Sutter’s home but twice in the women’s bathroom at the church on Race Track Road, deputies said.
The victim’s mother found photos, videos and texts of a sexual nature on her daughter’s phone, deputies said, and the daughter told her mother about the relationship. The mother then called the Sheriff’s Office.
Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.