Youth pastor groomed underage girls who attended church functions for kids, feds say
A youth pastor in Virginia could spend years in prison after his pattern of grooming underage girls who attended a church’s youth group program was exposed, federal prosecutors said.
Charles Willoughby III, 39, who prosecutors say served as a youth group leader at the New Life Worship Center in Norfolk, sexually abused those he groomed, including one victim he abused in the back of a bus during a trip to a church conference, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Virginia.
This victim spoke out about the abuse for the first time in 2018 after her mother told her about the “Me Too” movement, court documents show. She then confronted Willoughby who made a confession and more victims were identified, prosecutors said.
A New Life Worship Center spokesperson told McClatchy News on Dec. 13 that Willoughby was never a pastor at the church, but he was “immediately removed from any and all responsibilities concerning minors upon knowledge of the incident.”.
Willoughby was convicted on charges of traveling with intent to engage in illicit sexual conduct with a minor on Dec. 12, the attorney’s office announced in a news release.
Now he faces a potential maximum sentence of 30 years in prison, the release said.
McClatchy News contacted Willoughby’s attorney on Dec. 13 and didn’t immediately receive a response.
The case
Between 2006 and 2012, Willoughby’s groomed multiple teenage girls, prosecutors said.
Before Willoughby sexually abused one of his victims on a bus, he started cultivating a “trusting relationship” with her two years beforehand when she was 13, court documents show. This took place after she started attending New Life Worship Center in 2010.
Willoughby would text the teen, give her “long” hugs and discuss dating boys, a trial brief states. On one occasion, he took her out for a “practice ‘date’ to show her how she should be treated in the future,” prosecutors said.
In June 2012, Willoughby chaperoned a trip to the Youth Forward Conference in Atlanta and traveled by bus with other chaperones and church youth group members, including the girl who was 15 at the time, according to the trial brief.
The bus left Norfolk, and Willoughby volunteered to sit in the back row, prosecutors said.
At some point during the ride, he texted the 15-year-old girl to come to the last row “to talk,” the trial brief states.
When she sat down next to him, Willoughby began inappropriately touching her, masturbated and forced her to engage in a sexual act before falling asleep, according to prosecutors.
The next morning, the girl confronted Willoughby about the abuse and he blamed her, stating “since she did not move away, she must have wanted it,” the trial brief states.
The victim remained silent about the incident until 2018 when she told her parents about it, according to prosecutors.
Then she chose to confront him in a recorded phone call that captured him apologizing and admitting to forcing her to engage in a sex act, prosecutors said.
Afterward, the victim’s parents brought the recording to church Bishop Carl J. Vann to hear, according to prosecutors.
While the bishop said he’d “reprimand and ‘restore’” Willoughby, the parents never received an update, and he continued to work for the church, prosecutors said.
Willoughby was not included on the New Life Worship Center’s “about us” page listing church officials on Dec. 13.
Ultimately, Willoughby admitted to abusing the teen on the bus in 2012 when Virginia state police agents arrived to speak with him on May 8, 2018, prosecutors said.
He is accused of continuing to groom and abuse underage girls after the church conference in Atlanta ended in 2012.
Willoughby’s sentencing is scheduled for April 19, according to the release.
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