COLORADO
Daily Camera
By Mitchell Byars
Staff Writer
POSTED: 07/20/2015
Boulder prosecutors allege the four VineLife Church officials accused of covering up reports that a youth pastor at the church sexually assaulted a teenaged congregant have refused to accept responsibility for their actions and created a “disturbing culture of secrecy and non-disclosure” at the church.
“At the heart of this case is a local church’s coordinated effort to conceal a victim’s report of repeated acts of sexual abuse — perpetrated by a youth pastor, the son of one of the church’s elders — from the church’s own congregation, the local community and law enforcement in Boulder County,” prosecutors wrote in a sentencing memorandum filed in the case.
VineLife pastors Walter Roberson and Robert Young, as well as church elders Warren Williams and Edward Bennell, are due in Boulder County Court for sentencing Wednesday after pleading no contest to failure to report child abuse, a Class 3 misdemeanor.
According to the memorandum prepared by the Boulder County District Attorney’s Office, prosecutors are asking a judge to sentence the four men to either eight days on a jail work crew or 100 hours of community service.
Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.