Press Release from Henry Boyce:
Third Judicial District Prosecuting Attorney Henry Boyce announced today that Kenneth Dewitt, 67, of the Patterson Community in Woodruff County has pled guilty to three counts of Sexual Assault in the 3rd Degree.
Dewitt, the former prison chaplain at the Arkansas Department of Correction’s McPherson
Women’s Unit resigned from his position on September 10, 2014 after confessing to an inappropriate relationship with a subordinate. A subsequent investigation by the Arkansas State Police uncovered three female inmates Dewitt had engaged in sexual relations with during his employment as chaplain at the unit.
Dewitt will be sentenced to a ten year term in the Arkansas Department of Correction on each count to run concurrently with five years suspended on each count in Jackson County Circuit Court on August 3, 2016.
Boyce said, “After substantial preparation for trial in this case I am pleased that Mr. Dewitt has admitted his guilt and is willing to accept prison time as a result. Any time an employee of a correctional facility, not to mention a member of the clergy, takes advantage of his position of trust and authority to procure sexual favors the judicial system should exact punishment for that transgression.”
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