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October 30, 2004
Former pastor enters guilty pleas
Peckham faces 15 years in prison in child-sex cases
Jeff Lehr -- Globe Staff Writer -- joplinglobe.joplinglobe.com
Former Sarcoxie minister Donald Peckham changed his plea to guilty Friday on both counts of child-sexual abuse he was facing and was sentenced to 15 years in prison.
Peckham, 71, pleaded guilty in Jasper County Circuit Court to one count of first-degree sodomy and one count of second-degree sodomy in a plea agreement with the Jasper County prosecutor's office. Under terms of the agreement, Circuit Judge Jon Dermott sentenced Peckham to 15 years in prison on the first count and seven years in prison on the second count, with the two sentences to run concurrently.
The charges involved young adult, male victims who said they were sexually molested by Peckham when they were minors.
One alleged that Peckham performed an oral sex act on him 12 years ago when he was a 13-year-old boy in a rabbit shed behind Peckham's former home in Sarcoxie. The other involved a victim who alleged Peckham had performed the same act on him eight years ago when he was 14.
Prosecutor Dean Dankelson said the plea agreement closes the book on an investigation of the former minister of Jubilee Christian Fellowship Church in Sarcoxie that at one time was looking at as many as 12 possible child-sexual abuse victims.
"We thought these were the two cases we could make with victims who were willing to testify and were not barred by the statute of limitations," Dankelson said.
While some of the alleged victims involved were reluctant to testify, Dankelson said the investigation did not turn up any victims believed to have been making false claims against Peckham.
Peckham was the subject of a high-profile missing-person case in late June and early July that turned into a child sexual-abuse investigation. He disappeared on June 21 while purportedly on his way to visit an ailing congregation member at a Joplin hospital. He was located by detectives 17 days later in San Antonio, Texas, and brought back to Missouri where the allegations of child-sexual abuse began surfacing.
Publicity about his disappearance and return from Texas caused buried allegations of a similar nature to resurface in Kansas as well where he had been pastor at several Methodist churches prior to moving to Sarcoxie 30 years ago.
Peckham has remained in jail since the first charge was filed against him in July. His church, which removed him as minister in the wake of his arrest, reportedly has been struggling to stay intact, with Peckham's wife, Lorraine, conducting services in recent weeks.
Sarcoxie residents had varied reactions to his change of plea on Friday.
"I think - with all that's come out - that nobody's going to be overly shocked (by the change of plea)," said Don Sullivan, pastor of Freedom Christian Fellowship church in Sarcoxie.
He said many of the town's residents will probably view the plea change as "a blessing" that Peckham has decided not to put his family and others through the difficulties that a trial might present.
Posted by Nealus at October 30, 2004 01:24 PM
