A Georgia megachurch is facing allegations it failed to warn congregants about a former youth volunteer who’s been charged with trying to traffic a 16-year-old on the dark web.

Records obtained by The Roys Report (TRR) show that on June 30, authorities arrested Kelly Garrett Ivey—a former youth volunteer at Rock Springs Church in Milner, Ga.—and charged him with child cruelty and kidnapping. And last Monday, a grand jury indicted Ivey, 41, on first and second-degree charges of cruelty to children, trafficking, and three counts of criminal attempt to commit a felony, including kidnapping.

  • Tolstoshev@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    75
    arrow-down
    1
    ·
    1 year ago

    Me reading: Former youth volunteer who’s been charged with… “Here we go again, another groomer in the church”

    …trying to traffic a 16yo on the dark web. “What in the fuck???”

    • xuxebiko@kbin.social
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      12
      arrow-down
      1
      ·
      1 year ago

      when has it ever been them? But the bible-thumping crowd will continue to demonize vulnerable communities, because they don;t care about children being groomed or trafficked. They just want to be awful, horrible people and feel strong by punching down.

      It’s like their pro-forced birth stance, which is about denying women their basic human rights & controlling women.

    • diprount_tomato@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      3
      arrow-down
      42
      ·
      edit-2
      1 year ago

      Literally nobody should give a shit, the teen will be as traumatised no matter who did it

      Yes, that goes for certain News Agencies trying to get views by fearmongering

        • diprount_tomato@lemmy.world
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          4
          arrow-down
          22
          ·
          1 year ago

          What’s important is what was done, not who did it. The victim would suffer the same, no matter if the perpetrator was trans or Christian

          And also news agencies love fearmongering to get the clicks they no longer get

          • xuxebiko@kbin.social
            link
            fedilink
            arrow-up
            18
            arrow-down
            1
            ·
            1 year ago

            who did it also matters

            1. to highlight the group of people who are actually dangrous for kids & teens to be around,so the vulnerable can be kept safe,
              and
            2. to avoid the demonization of an innocent group of people
            • diprount_tomato@lemmy.world
              link
              fedilink
              English
              arrow-up
              3
              arrow-down
              13
              ·
              1 year ago

              Are teachers dangerous for kids and teens to be around? Cases of them abusing are sadly not uncommon

              And yes, let’s not demonize people, like all religious people or trans people

              • xuxebiko@kbin.social
                link
                fedilink
                arrow-up
                3
                arrow-down
                1
                ·
                1 year ago

                Are teachers dangerous for kids and teens to be around? Cases of them abusing are sadly not uncommon.

                so what is being done to vet out the dangerous ones?

          • theodewere@kbin.social
            link
            fedilink
            arrow-up
            7
            arrow-down
            1
            ·
            edit-2
            1 year ago

            it matters in this case… this person pretended to be someone the kid could trust… that church is corrupt, and so are all churches like it… they are run by greedy little men, who love power and influence because they are full of pride… they are corrupt…

    • PeleSpirit@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      22
      ·
      edit-2
      1 year ago

      According to The Reporter, arrest warrants stated that Ivey was trying to sell information about a 16-year-old’s home address and places she regularly frequented, so she could be abducted or harmed.

      Atlanta News First reported that the warrants also stated that Ivey advertised the “virgin female” on “Slave Bay”—a website advertising unclothed women on the dark web. The news report added that in July, a judge denied bond and said Ivey “posed a significant danger.”

      • diprount_tomato@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        5
        arrow-down
        3
        ·
        1 year ago

        TF? I thought those kind of places were just government run traps for people who’d use that services to fall for

        • jonne@infosec.pub
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          6
          ·
          1 year ago

          I mean, they probably are, and they caught someone. It’s like that joke website that offers hitman services that gets real enquiries once in a while.

          • sanpedropeddler@sh.itjust.works
            link
            fedilink
            English
            arrow-up
            16
            arrow-down
            1
            ·
            1 year ago

            I didn’t realize quite how dismissive of it they were. I still don’t agree with you 100% but in this case the church acted horribly and I was in the wrong with my last comment.

            • EsheLynn@lemmy.blahaj.zone
              link
              fedilink
              English
              arrow-up
              2
              arrow-down
              1
              ·
              1 year ago

              My son came out about being molested at church years after the fact. My brother thinks he lied about being molested four years after he stopped going to church, so he wouldn’t have to go to church (???), And my mom thinks it was my dad, not the pastor my son insists it is. Yes. It is “the church.”

          • RickRussell_CA@lemmy.world
            link
            fedilink
            English
            arrow-up
            4
            arrow-down
            1
            ·
            1 year ago

            The congregants seems to be jumping to the conclusion that the church was formally notified of Ivey’s status, somehow, and sat on the information while Ivey was still a threat. But it’s not clear this was the case.

            It doesn’t excuse church leaderships’ tone-deaf response to the arrest, though.

              • RickRussell_CA@lemmy.world
                link
                fedilink
                English
                arrow-up
                1
                arrow-down
                3
                ·
                1 year ago

                Considering how keyed in churches tend to be with local cops/fascists and that the cops and news stories would have contacted the church to find out if he had done anything else: They knew.

                But this is an educated guess; there is nothing in the article to support this timeline of events.

                Depending on who you believe, Ivey’s formal association with the church ended 20 months previous, or maybe he was seen at the church in an unofficial capacity as recently as June. Either way, there’s nothing here to suggest police had contacted the church or notified them. It would certainly be reasonable diligence for them to do so, but then police are not known for diligence. They may have also been concerned that someone would tip off Ivey and he would become a flight risk.

                The absolute bare minimum is to send out an email the moment the information is public

                Agreed. It is disappointing (if not surprising) that the church leadership did not IMMEDIATELY assess potential impact to the children of the church and school where Ivey volunteered.

          • diprount_tomato@lemmy.world
            link
            fedilink
            English
            arrow-up
            1
            arrow-down
            7
            ·
            1 year ago

            Seriously, what kind of Christians are they? Like, they just keep throwing the word around but don’t even say what type they follow

              • diprount_tomato@lemmy.world
                link
                fedilink
                English
                arrow-up
                1
                arrow-down
                5
                ·
                edit-2
                1 year ago

                What’s wrong about not having critical race theory in classrooms? Like, seeing it from an outside perspective it just sounds like a racist “one eye for an eye” with a Marxist lenses

                Edit: maybe instead of just downvoting what you don’t like to hear you should try to explain why critical race theory is actually good and why it should be taught in schools as something more than a radical ideology that appeared in the 60s

        • cre0@kbin.social
          link
          fedilink
          arrow-up
          3
          arrow-down
          5
          ·
          edit-2
          1 year ago

          And “the church” failed to disclose this guy’s actions to the parents of children that “the church” allowed him to be around.

          Is that really “the hill” you want to die on?

          • sanpedropeddler@sh.itjust.works
            link
            fedilink
            English
            arrow-up
            4
            arrow-down
            1
            ·
            1 year ago

            No it is not. I changed my mind after realizing how badly the church actually acted. I wrongfully assumed this was another case of people massively exagerrating the implications of a situation in a desperate attempt to demonize religion somehow. I should have looked more into it before making the comment, but I was too annoyed for critical thinking and my instincts got the better of me.

        • diprount_tomato@lemmy.world
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          3
          arrow-down
          11
          ·
          1 year ago

          Oh NOOO! You can’t just contradict my intelectual atheism for smart people by saying an individual that didn’t even have power represents the church and how degenerate it is!!!

          • sanpedropeddler@sh.itjust.works
            link
            fedilink
            English
            arrow-up
            7
            arrow-down
            1
            ·
            1 year ago

            I was actually in the wrong on this one. Someone else corrected me and the church acted far worse than I originally thought. They should have taken the situation much more seriously and notified the parents of the situation at the very least.

              • sanpedropeddler@sh.itjust.works
                link
                fedilink
                English
                arrow-up
                3
                ·
                1 year ago

                I made the comment originally because I thought that’s what they were doing, but now I think they meant “the church” as just that specific church.

                • diprount_tomato@lemmy.world
                  link
                  fedilink
                  English
                  arrow-up
                  1
                  arrow-down
                  3
                  ·
                  1 year ago

                  I mean, it’s really easy to get defensive on the internet where you can’t really clear up misunderstandings in comments and you can’t directly see the commenter’s intentions

    • thefartographer@lemm.ee
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      8
      arrow-down
      1
      ·
      1 year ago

      Because 16 years old was probably getting too close to the expiration date for this monster and figured he could make a quick buck

  • HubertManne@kbin.social
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    6
    ·
    1 year ago

    this is the problem with the name of this sub. not really the name but like I had a guy in another convo suggest catholicism was worse than other christians because of the kid didlin and its like dude its all over in the other churches they just don’t have a large central authority to go after.

  • AEsheron@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    4
    ·
    1 year ago

    Maybe it’s just the end of work grogginess, but I read, “trying to sell teen on dark net,” as though they were trying to convince them to check it out, by a marijuana, etc. Like trying to sell your friend on a TV show or something.

  • 4RYAZ@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    2
    arrow-down
    24
    ·
    1 year ago

    Bad luck his family name isn’t Biden he would have been fine with it