TENNESSEE/KENTUCKY
The Raw Story
By David Edwards
Wednesday, July 9, 2014
Officials at a Kentucky church said this week that they knew their pastor was a registered violent sex offender when they hired him, and now he’s facing more charges for repeatedly raping a 14-year-old member of the congregation.
The Gallatin Police Department said in a statement this week that 46-year-old Pastor Roy Neal Yoakem had been arrested Monday on charges of aggravated statutory rape, sexual battery by an authority figure, statutory rape by an authority figure and fugitive from justice, The Tennessean reported.
Yoakem is accused of sexually assaulting a 14-year-old boy once inside New Gospel Outreach Church in Scottsville, Kentucky, and once at his home in Gallatin, Tennessee.
The pastor had been required to register as a violent sex offender after being found guilty in 2005 of abusing an 8-year-old boy in Kentucky.
“If (a convicted sex offender) has a secondary address or if they spend a certain amount of time a month in the state, they have to register here,” a statement from Gallatin Police Department spokesperson Bill Storment explained. So, his primary residence is in Kentucky, but the Gallatin residence is considered his secondary address.”
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