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Jury deadlocks on whether eastern New Orleans pastor molested boy from his flock
By Ken Daley
An Orleans Parish jury deadlocked Tuesday (Nov. 17) on whether the pastor of an eastern New Orleans church molested a young boy who was a member of his congregation more than a decade ago. Kevin Boyd Sr., the 46-year-old "presiding bishop" of The Church At New Orleans, faced a prison sentence of five to 10 years if convicted as charged of molestation of a juvenile. Boyd is accused of sexually assaulting the child over a span of at least five years, starting in 1999 when the boy was about 12. The jury of three women and three men announced it was deadlocked after four hours of deliberations. The jury had the option to convict or acquit Boyd with responsive verdicts of lesser charges, including attempted molestation. But the six-member panel was unable to concur on any verdict. "The jurors listened to the evidence. Each and every one of them is entitled to their individual decision," said Boyd's defense attorney Kerry Cuccia. "These jurors had given a tremendous amount of thought and effort into the case, and they simply disagreed on what the proper result should be. And rather than it resorting to something it should not be, they respected each other's positions and said they could not reach a unanimous verdict." Jurors received the case at 1:25 p.m., after hearing instructions from criminal court Judge Camille Buras. Assistant district attorney Andrew DeCoste described Boyd as a manipulative predator in his closing rebuttal argument. "This man before you has been uncloaked as the monster he really is," DeCoste told the jury. "He used the church as his little perverted playground." The state's case featured two adult men who testified Boyd sexually assaulted them, several years apart, when they were church youths sometimes entrusted by their single mothers Boyd's care. Boyd was indicted on charges of molesting each boy, but was tried this week only on the charge of assaulting the younger accuser, who now is 27. "Two young men, in the same church, at the hands of the same pastor, years apart, experienced the same sexual abuse," DeCoste told jurors. "For years, (the accuser) was too scared to come forward. That silence cost him a decade of sexual abuse, because he was too scared to go against the pastor, who he saw as God." Cuccia attempted to methodically pick holes in the testimony of Boyd's accusers during a nearly 90-minute closing argument. Cuccia suggested a vendetta against Boyd, orchestrated by a church leader Boyd fired as pastor of another congregation he manages, The Church at Jackson, in Mississippi. Cuccia said the fired pastor, Lionel J. Traylor, helped the accuser file lawsuits against Boyd in 2010 in Mississippi and 2011 in New Orleans' federal court. The defense attorney had the jury read several of Traylor's Facebook posts that Cuccia said demonstrated enmity for Boyd, including one that read, "I once was told I was too great for a certain house. My response: Keep the house, I'm taking the land." Cuccia, who defended Boyd with co-counsel Kimya Holmes, told the jurors, "You have to ask yourself what are the motivations for bringing this accusation against Kevin Boyd. The answer is the civil lawsuits asking for money damages. (The accuser) told you all he wants is a public apology and for Bishop Boyd to stop preaching and get some help. But that's not what is in his lawsuits. What is in his lawsuits is a demand for money." More than three dozen of Boyd's congregants packed the wooden courtroom pews in support of the pastor during the weeklong trial, and often were seen in the courthouse hallway holding hands in prayer. The accuser spent parts of three days on the witness stand. He described in graphic detail sexual abuse he said he endured from Boyd. The man said the abuse started with groping he initially thought harmless, but escalated to painful incidents of penetration. The accuser said he has been cast out from the church, with only a few members still supporting him. "I feel like it's me against the world," he testified. "There's a lot of people who want my neck, want my head." NOLA.com | The Times-Picayune generally does not identify persons alleging they were victims of sexual assaults. DeCoste's co-counsel, prosecutor Diana Netterville, told the jury in her closing argument that Kevin Boyd "is a fake. He is neither a preacher, nor a pastor. He is a predator. He preyed upon their innocence." A pretrial conference was set for Dec. 15 to discuss when or if Boyd will be re-tried.
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