ALABAMA
Associated Baptist Press
By Bob Allen
Leaders of a Baptist association in Alabama investigated questions raised in recent media reports about a director of mission’s handling of alleged child sex abuse decades ago in 2009 and found no evidence of cover-up, according to a news story dated July 17 in the Alabama Baptist.
Recent news stories about the May 20 arrest of a former youth minister at Lakeside Baptist Church in Birmingham, Ala., included comments by one of the alleged victims claiming the pastor at the time, Mike McLemore, knew about the abuse but kept it quiet to protect the congregation’s image.
Mack Allen Davis, 73, minister of youth and recreation at Lakeside Baptist Church from 1977 until his retirement in 1999, faces 15 charges from three counties stemming from allegations by two men who stepped forward to claim that Davis molested them 30 years ago.
One of the men, Davis’ nephew, Andrew Guffey, 44, told the Birmingham News that McLemore, now director of missions for Birmingham Baptist Association, knew about the abuse by the late 1990s but did not report it to the police.
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