Pastor on sexual assault charge remanded

There was a stir in the Kingston and St Andrew Parish Court on Tuesday after the revelation that a Westmoreland pastor who was answering to fraud related charges was also wanted for allegedly committing sexual assault against a minor.

The defendant, who will not be named by THE STAR to protect the complainant, a 17-year-old boy, was to be sentenced for conspiracy to defraud, computer-related fraud and uttering a forged document. But new details emerged in a social enquiry report, which related that the pastor was being sought in relation to buggery and indecent assault claims by the complainant, who was 13 at the time.

The pastor left the island on January 11, 2020 for Baltimore, in the US and requested asylum. According to US Court of Appeal documents, it is alleged that the pastor, who served in the church for more than 10 years, "is a gay man but kept his sexuality a secret for fear of anti-gay hostility in Jamaica".

Allegations further detailed that the complainant and his family were members of the church where the defendant was a pastor and that in 2017, the pastor kissed the complainant. A year later, the pastor sexually assaulted the teen.

However, the pastor denies the allegations and argued before American judges that he should not be returned to Jamaica because he did not "commit a serious non-political crime" and that he will be "tortured in Jamaica given the country's pervasive hostility towards gay persons like himself".

As the pastor argued for asylum in the US, Jamaican authorities, in collaboration with INTERPOL, issued two red notices for his arrest on March 9, 2020. The matter is now before the St Ann's Circuit Court.

The pastor's application for protection was subsequently denied and an order for his immediate removal was approved. He was deported to Jamaica but is challenging that report. He also refuted that he had been deported as was read by Senior Parish Judge Lori-Anne Cole-Montaque.

"Based on discussions with my lawyer, I was told to come back to finish the matters I had before the court. So it was a voluntary decision," the pastor stressed.

But the judge was not satisfied with his explanation and chided him for committing the fraud offences in 2023.

"If you know you had come back to answer to charges for one matter in 2021, that is why you should have been keeping yourself on the straight and narrow, not to find yourself in another situation in 2023. This is a brazen one," she expressed.

She postponed sentencing in the fraud-related matters and remanded him until March 22.