In 2015, Charles Woodall was arrested and charged with molesting three boys he met through his work at Northway Church in Macon, Georgia. Last Friday, Woodall was convicted of his crimes.
Amy Leigh Womack, a reporter for The Telegraph, reports:
Jurors deliberated for about two hours before finding former GBI agent Charles Woodall guilty of molesting three boys he met through his work at Macon’s Northway Church.
Woodall, who was taken into custody after the verdict was announced, was found guilty of six counts of child molestation, five counts of enticing a child for indecent purposes and one count of violating his oath as an agent. He will be sentenced at a later date.
District Attorney David Cooke said Woodall “abused the trust of two of our most sacred institutions, the church and the badge. Now he will have to answer for his crimes thanks to the courage of his victims who came forward to hold him accountable.”
Testimony in Woodall’s trial began Tuesday in Bibb County Superior Court.
The 36-year-old testified Thursday, calmly denying all the allegations against him. He said he didn’t know why the boys — whom he’d met during stints as a volunteer and other times as an employee of the Zebulon Road church — would make such serious allegations against him.
In her closing argument to jurors, prosecutor Nancy Scott Malcor recounted statements of 11 men — who were teenagers at the time of the alleged inappropriate contact with Woodall in Georgia and Tennessee — and reminded jurors of their “eerily similar stories.”
“Their stories are the same because the defendant is a pervert who hasn’t changed his playbook in 15 years,” she said. “These men are telling the truth. They have nothing to gain by lying. … They’re saying these things because they’re true.”
Allegations against Woodall date from 2005 to 2014.
Woodall testified he got a job at a Knoxville, Tennessee, church after dropping out of college following his freshman year.
At first he worked with the church’s afters-school program and then began volunteering with the youth group.
In 2005, he moved to Macon and began a summer internship working with youth at Northway Church, formerly known as Vineville North Baptist Church, Woodall testified.
At the end of the internship, he was hired as an assistant to the student pastor, a position he held until going back to college in 2007, with hopes of one day becoming a federal law enforcement officer.
In December 2011, Woodall was hired by the GBI as a crime scene specialist and was working as a field agent at the time of his 2015 arrest. The GBI assisted in Woodall’s prosecution.
Charles Cox, Woodall’s lawyer, said the actions of the men who accused his client of impropriety don’t match their words.
“Their words say Mr. Woodall is guilty. Their behavior says he’s innocent,” Cox said in his closing argument. “Actions speak louder than words.”
Cox said the men sought out a relationship with Woodall after the alleged inappropriate conduct supposedly occurred.
He said there’s no computer or credit card evidence that supports allegations Woodall purchased pornography he was accused of showing the men when they were teens.
There’s also no evidence he bought a sex toy he’s accused of providing to the boys, Cox said.
In a November 25, 2015 article, Womack reported:
The investigation of a former GBI agent charged with molesting three boys has revealed other alleged victims in Georgia and Tennessee, as well as an allegation in Dallas, Texas.
Bill Bodrey, assistant special agent in charge of the GBI’s Perry office, testified during a hearing Wednesday that 34-year-old Charles Woodall also was investigated in 2014, but insufficient evidence was found to prosecute.
Since authorities launched a new investigation about two months ago, allegations brought forward by others have corroborated the account that the boy in the 2014 case described, he said.
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He is charged with nine counts of child molestation, six counts of enticing a child for indecent purposes, one count of electronically furnishing obscene material to minors, and violating his oath of office.
The charges stem from allegations that he molested three boys between September 2005 and February 2014.
Woodall, who became a GBI agent in December 2011, resigned in lieu of termination last month during the investigation.
He’d been assigned to the GBI’s Milledgeville field office, but he had interned at the Perry office before being hired as an agent.
When speaking with the GBI, one of the boys said he’d met Woodall at Northway Church on Zebulon Road in north Macon, Bodrey testified.
Woodall was a small group leader and mentor for the church’s youth and played in a church band, Bodrey said.
The boy told agents that his sexual contact with Woodall began when he was 13 or 14 years old, after the boy had confessed that he was addicted to pornography, Bodrey said.
Woodall offered to help the boy. Between 2009 and 2014, he drove the boy from his home to Woodall’s home or from church to Woodall’s home, where Woodall provided a sex toy and pornography to the boy, and touched the boy’s genitals, Bodrey testified.
Later, after the boy turned 16 and Woodall had left his position at the church to become a GBI agent, Woodall and the boy met at a motel room, where Woodall again provided pornography and a sex toy, and touched the boy’s genitals, Bodrey said.
Agent Jason Shoudel testified that Woodall provided pornography and a sex toy for two other boys, whom he drove individually from their home north of Macon to his home in Macon, where he coached them on how to pleasure themselves.
“He called it being his accountability partner with the church,” Shoudel said.
Between 2005 and 2007, one of the boys alleges that he had contact with Woodall once or twice a month, beginning when he was 12 or 13.
Years later, when the boy was 16 or 17, Woodall took the boy to a location outside Bibb County and gave him alcohol, Shoudel said.
Another boy alleges that he had contact with Woodall at least a dozen times between 2009 and 2011 when he was between 14 and 15, the agent testified.
At some point, Woodall took him to a motel room near the Mall of Georgia, north of Atlanta, where he gave him alcohol and touched his genitals, Shoudel said.
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