MISSOURI
Associated Press
March 5, 2020
A Missouri youth group leader has been charged with raping one girl and exchanging nude photos with two others.
Twenty-two-year-old Benjamin Blake, of Rogersville, was freed on bond Wednesday after he was charged last week with the rape count and five other felonies.
The probable cause statement says he convinced one of the girls whom he is accused of exchanging photos with to perform a sex act on him and threatened to harm himself if the other girl didn’t send pictures, the Springfield News-Leader reports.
The statement says Blake, who was a youth group leader at Temple Baptist Church in Marshfield, was 18 and 19 at the time, while the girls were 13 and 14.
His attorney didn’t immediately return a phone message from the News-Leader or The Associated Press.
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