Brian Burchfield is accused of sending inappropriate text messages to teenage boys who attend a church he once worked for in Shawnee.
We’re told Burchfield was the youth pastor at Immanuel Baptist Church for several years and gained the trust of some teenage boys in the youth group.
Police tell us they’ve talked to four of those boys in the past week who told them their text conversations with Burchfield were starting to make them uncomfortable.
Police tell us Burchfield would ask the boys for pictures of themselves and talk to them about pornography.
Burchfield was arraigned Thursday, accused of crimes that have shocked families from Shawnee to Edmond.
Investigators say Burchfield had been inappropriately texting four former youth group members, all boys between the ages 14 and 17.
“They looked at him almost like a second father figure. They trusted him completely in the status he was in, his role in their lives,” Detective Ethan Rieves said.
“They trusted him completely,” Former Shawnee youth pastor arraigned on sex crime charges | KFOR.com
See also:
Youth pastor’s arrest affects two churches - Leaders of both his current and former church say they had no suspicion about a youth pastor who reportedly confessed to police that he tried to solicit sex from teenagers.
Police say after leaving the Shawnee church, Burchfield continued texting the four teens and over time the messages got more inappropriate. They don’t believe he had any physical contact with the boys but appeared to be grooming them for future sexual activity.
Unlike some denominations, the Southern Baptist Convention lacks any formal system for receiving, evaluating and reporting allegations of sexual abuse by clergy. The SBC Executive Committee has a resource page for sexual abuse prevention on its website, and LifeWay Christian Resources offers criminal background checks costing between $10 and $20.
No comments:
Post a Comment