Page 14 - IAV Digital Magazine #599

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Mt Olive Primitive Baptist Church Pastor Arrested On Accusation of Rape
By Lee Ann Anderson
The Gainesville Police Department arrested a pastor Sunday on suspi- cion of raping his 15-year-old niece, who was booked into UF Health Shands Hospital for examination a day after the inci- dent.
Christopher Whitehead has served as a Mount Olive
Primitive Baptist pastor for two years with experi- ence in the church’s youth department. He also has nine children.
Originally from Tallahassee, Whitehead’s 15- year-old niece and other family members visited Gainesville to celebrate the two-year anniver- sary of Whitehead being at the church, staying in a home
attached to the church lot.
His niece asked her cousins if they could send money to her on Cash App, to which they declined. She later went into the master bed- room to ask Whitehead for money and found him lying in bed. Upon informing her he wouldn’t send her money, Whitehead asked his niece to sleep in the same bed
as him, to which she said yes and grabbed her charger and melatonin, according to the arrest report.
Whitehead put his hand on the girl’s waist as she faced away from him, and she pushed his hand away. He eventu- ally pulled his niece closer to him and proceed- ed to rape her. Upon Whitehead asking her pain level, she said it was a “10” out of 10, to which he continued to rape her, according to the arrest report.
One of Whitehead’s chil- dren opened the door and his niece quickly left to “needing a drink” as a means to escape.
The 15-year-old
told Dawandera Whitehead, her uncle’s wife, about the inci- dent. In front of the victim, she confronted Christopher Whitehead, to which he asked if anything could be fixed and if he could speak with his niece private- ly. His wife said no.
When Whitehead and his wife were alone, he apolo- gized for the situ- ation and his role in putting them there. When taken into cus- tody, he denied harming the girl.
Whitehead’s wife said she had never witnessed her husband invite a child to sleep in his bed prior to the inci- dent during the entirety of their marriage.
Whitehead was charged with sex- ual assault of a minor. His priors include minor traffic violations.
Dominique Howard-Bernard, a church-goer who serves on the Youth Usher Board, said she was distraught to hear the news. He had previous- ly been well-per- ceived at the church for his “uplifting” attitude until now.
“This is very heart[breaking] as a member of the church and has me feeling crazy because he [was] supposed to be the sheep of the church and lead people to the lord,” she wrote in a text message. “He just needs to be in Hell at this point.”
iAV - Antelope Valley Digital Magazine