Accused prison chaplain named

Sex with inmates reported

The Arkansas Department of Correction released Friday the identity of a former chaplain who is accused of having a sexual relationship with inmates.

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Correction Department spokesman Cathy Frye confirmed Friday that Kenneth Dewitt, 66, of Patterson, who had worked in the prison system since 2001, was reported to state police in December after two female prisoners at the McPherson Unit in Newport said they had sexual relationships with Dewitt for about 3½ years. By state law, prisoners cannot consent to sexual relations.

Frye first discussed the accusations June 11 after the U.S. Justice Department announced that an investigation had been opened for "numerous allegations" of sexual abuse and sexual harassment, as well as the mistreatment of transgender women, at McPherson. Frye refused to name Dewitt then, and instead referred to him as a "former chaplain."

In response to a June 12 Freedom of Information Act request from the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, Frye provided Dewitt's personnel files late Friday.

"He is barred from working for the Department of Correction. He is not subject to rehire," Frye said.

The documents show Dewitt resigned using a handwritten note Sept. 10, saying simply: "Please be advised that effective today I resign as chaplain of McPherson Unit. Newport, AR."

On Sept. 11, former McPherson inmate Stacey Smith wrote a letter to the Correction Department's assistant director, John Mark Wheeler, verifying that "Chaplain Dewitt and I had a moral failure. This failure did not occur while I was incarcerated, but years after my release. My emotional attachment began sometime at the end of 2010 and our moral failure was after one of the conferences in 2012. I am not aware of any relationships with any inmates. I regret the damage that this failure has caused the chaplaincy."

In a Sept. 16 memo to the prison's human resources department, Wheeler said that Dewitt "called and confessed to having an inappropriate physical relationship with a subordinate in violation of AD 12-33. He was offered the opportunity to resign and he resigned effective immediately."

Frye said Friday that she did not know whether Dewitt was part of the federal investigation, but the department sent a letter Thursday to the Justice Department asking for details of the allegations.

The federal agency received "numerous allegations" concerning "multiple" McPherson Unit staff members engaging in intercourse and other sexual acts with prisoners, exchanging commissary money for sexual favors and inappropriately watching prisoners while they showered or changed clothes, a June 11 Justice Department news release said.

"If what they are alleging is occurring, that is a crime and it is certainly something we would investigate," Frye said.

A 2008 report by the U.S. Department of Justice's Bureau of Justice Statistics said that Arkansas inmates are more than twice as likely to be the victims of a substantiated instance of sexual abuse or harassment than state and federal prisoners nationwide.

In a May 15 letter to the Justice Department, Gov. Asa Hutchinson told the agency the state could not comply with the national Prison Rape Elimination Act, making Arkansas one of only five states in the nation that declined to offer certification or an assurance of compliance with the federal Act, which aims to protect inmates from sexual assaults in custody.

State Desk on 06/20/2015

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