Former youth pastor found guilty on sexual battery charges

FLORIDA
Daily Commercial

Posted: Saturday, August 2, 2014

Millard K. Ives | Staff Writer millardives@dailycommercial.com

A former Eustis youth pastor initially jailed in 2012 on allegations of sexually assaulting two developmentally disabled people at a group home and a child at a day care center has been found guilty.

In the three-day trial at the Lake County Courthouse, it took a jury about one hour on Thursday to bring back guilty verdicts for Kenneth Mar Hagins, 42, on one count each of sexual battery of a mentally defective person and lewd and lascivious molestation, according to the State Attorney’s Office.

Hagins remains at the Lake County jail and will be sentenced at a later date. Hagins faces 35 years in prison on the convictions, said Walter Forgie, the supervising assistant State’s Attorney at the Lake County office.

Hagins, of Tavares, was a youth pastor at a Eustis church and simultaneously worked for Pat’s Kidz World Development Center in Eustis and at an adult group home for SunriseArc, which serves developmentally disabled people, when the Lake County Sheriff’s Office and the Department of Children and Families initiated a joint investigation of him in July 2012.

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