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  Christian Music Star's Daughter Testifies

By Pierrette J. Shields
Longmont Times-Call
November 9, 2007

http://www.timescall.com/News_Story.asp?id=4534

BOULDER — A Christian music star's daughter testified Thursday in Boulder District Court about how her family persuaded a Longmont woman to report a sexual relationship with a church leader she had as a teenager.

Emily Chapman, daughter of Grammy Award-winning singer Steven Curtis Chapman, told jurors about her college roommate's 2005 confession to her about a sexual relationship with Central Presbyterian Church's youth director.

Peter Kim, 40, of Longmont was arrested in October 2006 and is on trial this week on charges of sexual abuse of a child by one in a position of trust and sexual assault on a child with a pattern of abuse, both felonies. Police and prosecutors believe Kim had a sexual relationship with a Longmont girl in his youth group at the church. The accuser testified earlier this week.

Kim pleaded guilty in 2003 to misdemeanor sexual assault on a child after an Aurora woman who was in a youth group led by Kim in Englewood made similar allegations. The conviction meant he had to register as a sex offender, and it cost him his Longmont job. Kim worked at the Longmont church from 2000 until March 2003.

Emily Chapman said her roommate's confession came after the accuser endured a renewed battle with bulimia, apparently brought on by stress from attempts to end the relationship with Kim.

Kim's accuser "said when she was in high school she had been sexually molested by her youth pastor," Emily Chapman recalled about the night her roommate told her about the relationship.

Emily Chapman added she tried to remain quiet and listen as her friend recounted the relationship, which, according to prosecutors stretched from the accuser's sophomore year of high school in Longmont through her freshman year of college in Texas in 2005.

"I was in shock," Emily Chapman said. "I had no idea it was coming."

According to Kim's accuser's testimony Wednesday, she and Kim had a progressively physical relationship that culminated in sexual contact before her 18th birthday. She is now 21.

The accuser said in court that her openly close relationship with Kim raised eyebrows, especially among teenage boys in the church youth group.

Kim is 20 years older than his accuser and was married with two small children at the time.

Emily Chapman said she and her roommate agreed to seek help from Chapman's parents. The college students flew to Nashville to visit Steven Curtis Chapman and his wife.

The Chapmans proposed that the Longmont woman and her parents attend the musician's December 2005 concert at the Pepsi Center in Denver. Afterward, the Longmont woman told her parents about the relationship with Kim, Emily Chapman said.

Prosecutors also called other church members to the witness stand Thursday to testify about their observations of Kim.

Michelle Reed, the accuser's best friend from high school, said she did not want to believe anything bad of Kim even after he was fired from Central Presbyterian over his guilty plea in the Aurora woman's case.

Reed told jurors her opinion of Kim changed on May 26, 2006, when she saw him rubbing the accuser's neck while a group of friends watched television together in Kim's basement.

Kim's trial is scheduled to resume today.

Pierrette J. Shields can be reached at 303-684-5273 or pshields@times-call.com.

 
 

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