The Black Collar Crime Series relies on public news stories and publicly available information for its content. If any incorrect information is found, please contact Bruce Gerencser. Nothing in this post should be construed as an accusation of guilt. Those accused of crimes are innocent until proven guilty.
Last year, Doug Edwards, pastor of First Baptist Church in Ketchikan, Alaska and a recently retired home economics teacher at Ketchikan High School, was arrested and charged with six counts of sexual abuse of a minor. According to KRBD, Edwards sexually assaulted a fourteen-year-old church girl. Yesterday, Edwards pleaded guilty to one count of sexual abuse of a minor.
A former Ketchikan High School teacher pleaded guilty Wednesday to sexual abuse of a minor through a plea agreement that calls for him to serve six years in jail.
Doug Edwards was charged last spring with six counts of sexual abuse of a minor for groping a then-14-year-old girl’s chest at the school, at his home and at the church where he was a pastor. The plea agreement consolidates those six charges into one Class B felony.
Superior Court Judge William Carey explained what that means to Edwards and others in the courtroom.
“So what this does is consolidate all six into one conviction, however he is basically admitting the conduct in all of them,” Carey said. “And the fact that, even though there is one conviction, it looks like the fact that other acts, multiple acts, are consolidated into this, makes the sex-offender registration requirement lifetime as opposed to 15 years.”
After he’s served his time in prison, Edwards will be required to register as a sex offender, and update that registration every three months for the rest of his life.
The plea agreement called for a sentence of 18 years with 12 suspended. That leaves six to serve, but with “good time,” Edwards could be released after four years.
Hi Bruce, Thank you for your diligence with this series. You have collected so many examples of black collar crime it’s stunning. Did you have any inkling of this while you were a pastor? Do you think there is something uniquely Christian about this, as it were, or do you think this is a dynamic that is prominent in any community in which you have strong patriarchalism tied to imperatives of religious obedience? Thank you for your thoughts and your work on this as always.
Here’s my answer to your questions: http://brucegerencser.net/2019/02/clergy-sex-crimes-the-stunning-number-of-black-collar-crime-reports/
Someone else from Golden State got pinched sleeping with a teenager recently too. I think he was a BigWig at the school. Why don’t these guys just fool around with women their own age. Why do they always try to screw teenagers. I think maybe because as teenagers they were repressed sexually with the religious stuff that perhaps it has f…ed them up in a psycho sexual manner.