Days after fleeing prosecution in Florida for allegedly sexually assaulting an alcohol-impaired teenager, former police officer and pastor Monte Lavelle Chitty is now again in custody because of a quick-thinking Texas church.
Chitty, 62, who served as a pacesetter at First Baptist of Marathon, was accused of getting a 15-year-old church member drunk and sexually assaulting her. He went on the run weeks after being launched on $75,000 bail.
Officers with the Monroe County Sheriff's Workplace in Texas informed 6 South Florida that Chitty was arrested round 5:00 pm Friday in Woodville after reaching out to a church group working with the homeless. He was acknowledged by a church member who contacted the police.
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The information comes as former members of Chitty's church led in Chilly Bay, Alaska, recalled “immoral” habits between him and one other younger lady who lived together with his household that just about tore the church aside.
Church leaders had been so alarmed by the state of affairs that all of them joined in shopping for a aircraft ticket for the lady to flee Chitty, who they are saying used his place as a pastor and regulation enforcement officer to achieve individuals's belief.
“He used two of the most secure and most trusted roles locally,” Stephanie DeVault, who lived in Chilly Bay when Chitty was a pastor there, informed the Anchorage Day by day Information. Along with his work as a pastor, Chitty additionally served because the False Cross Village Public Security Officer for the Pribilof Aleutian Islands Affiliation through the ten years he lived in Alaska. He later moved to Florida in 2021.
Stephanie DeVault and her husband, Ty DeVault, who led the False Cross church the place Chitty served earlier than he took over, stated a number of the tales Chitty informed them about her previous didn't add up.
When “immoral” personal messages between Chitty and a younger lady who lived together with his household had been made public in 2012, the church fell on onerous instances.
“It was immoral, however it wasn't unlawful,” Stephanie DeVault recalled.
The one method they felt they may intervene was to get the younger lady away from Chitta with a one-way ticket from Chilly Bay.
“We obtained her out as a result of she was afraid for her security,” Stephanie DeVault stated.
The couple stated that when Chitty used his affect to dismiss the younger lady as an issue, many individuals believed him.
The incident involving the younger lady leaving city “fully tore the church aside,” former Chilly Bay Mayor Candace Nielsen informed the Anchorage Day by day Information.
Chitty, who just lately based a port ministry for the Boot Key boating group, did not attend a scheduled courtroom listening to on April 1, and prosecutors stated he fled the state in a white van with overseas plates.
The pastor was beforehand charged with sexual harassment of a minor, lewd and lascivious habits and contributing to the delinquency of a minor, the Monroe County Sheriff's Workplace stated.
It was first reported by an nameless caller who overheard a teenage woman telling an grownup she had been raped.
“The caller stated the woman and her grandmother obtained into a ship and headed to the marina. As officers tried to find the sufferer, communications officers acquired a second name from the suspect, Monte Chitty, who’s a pastor at First Baptist Church in Marathon,” the report stated.
“Chitty stated he believed he was going to be accused of one thing and wished to stop that. He stated a younger woman at his church had been consuming and handed out on a sofa within the church library. He stated he helped her lie down on the sofa however didn't contact her afterward .”
Police contacted {the teenager} on the boat the place she lives, and he or she informed them the pastor had given her alcohol that might have been “spiked.”
“She stated that she instantly began feeling weak and misplaced consciousness. She stated that when she awoke, she discovered Chitty sexually harassing her,” the report stated.
Investigators later discovered textual content messages between {the teenager} and the pastor by which he “referred to sexual relations with the woman whereas she was disturbed.”
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