Post by livinganewlife on Jun 9, 2006 12:15:24 GMT -5
Church Pedophile Part I
By Steve Wilson
Web produced by Sarah Morgan
May 24, 2006
Ryan Baker calls himself a man of God with a ministry of music, but Chief Investigative reporter Steve Wilson found a dark secret he never tells.
He’s a sexual predator, a confessed and convicted child molester hiding in plain site where you’d never expect—inside local churches filled with children and linked with big names in gospel music.
Dorinda Clark Cole, one of Detroit’s own renowned Clark Sisters and a gospel music star in her own right, said her choreographer is Ryan Baker.
Baker is well known in Detroit-area church circles as a dancer with a musical ministry.
One woman, who didn’t want to be identified, also knows Brother Baker and initially thought highly of him and his work.
"It’s like an anointing he has to touch people through his dance ministry, especially the kids because that’s the kind of dance he does," she said.
The woman said she knows the dark and disturbing secret Brother Baker himself surely never mentions in church or anywhere else—his interest in young boys like her 14-year-old son.
"He made him take his clothes off and he fondled him," she said.
The woman said it happened when she, a religious entertainment promoter herself, invited him to dance at one of her events in the fall 2 and a half years ago.
"I just followed my heart and I just didn’t believe, I trusted him. And I trusted him with my family," she said.
When the woman confided to other people, she said she learned it wasn’t Baker’s first transgression with young boys.
"That’s when the light came on, like okay, this is what happened because other younger boys came and said, ‘Well, your boy’s in there trippin’. He touched me inappropriately,’" she said.
The woman said the incident happened September 21 in front of church elders.
Baker admitted it almost immediately and repeated the confession in front of his parents and others from the church shortly thereafter.
The woman said she went to the police a couple of days later—though she claims the church folks pressured her not to, to let them handle it.
Baker was arrested, charged and sent to court in Ann Arbor where he confessed again and pleaded guilty to a charge of criminal sexual conduct in the fourth degree.
He got no jail time, but was put on 3 years probation, ordered to have no contact with children, told to register as a sex offender and complete a sex offender program.
He was ordered to stay away from schools and playgrounds, maintain his employment and to not leave the state of Michigan.
So imagine the surprise of his victim’s mother when she heard he was at a Detroit church still performing with children present.
She said church officials told Baker’s probation officers..."He was supervised, but then the probation said it didn’t matter if he was supervised he can’t perform."
Not long after, when the woman tuned in to the Soul Train music awards and there he was again—out in California, dancing on a program that included children in the building.
She alerted authorities and the judge amended the probation order to make it crystal clear.
Baker was "prohibited from performing or working" anywhere children are involved.
Recently, Action News shot undercover video at a Pontiac church and Baker admitted to an Action News intern, "I have a dance camp or a dance company that I teach from 8, I’m sorry, from 4 to 18."
At the Greater Immanuel Institutional Church where the victim’s mother insists he has been performing after the incident, Pastor Drew Sheard said, "He has not performed in our church since we got that information and I am emphatic, I am not making a mistake on that. I know that for a fact."
Sheard also said he has heard that Baker has been performing elsewhere.
The folks at St. James Missionary Baptist Church in Pontiac, where Action New caught him with a church full of children, said they had no idea about his background when an outsider brought him in to emcee a fundraiser.
Action News has no evidence that Baker’s continued association with children has resulted in additional assaults, but it’s clear he has no business anywhere near a child, yet will not stop.
Tonight at 11 we’ll show you what he had to say for himself when Chief Investigator Steve Wilson sat with him for some answers and found out exactly where he’s headed next.
We have to watch our children on every hand!!!
By Steve Wilson
Web produced by Sarah Morgan
May 24, 2006
Ryan Baker calls himself a man of God with a ministry of music, but Chief Investigative reporter Steve Wilson found a dark secret he never tells.
He’s a sexual predator, a confessed and convicted child molester hiding in plain site where you’d never expect—inside local churches filled with children and linked with big names in gospel music.
Dorinda Clark Cole, one of Detroit’s own renowned Clark Sisters and a gospel music star in her own right, said her choreographer is Ryan Baker.
Baker is well known in Detroit-area church circles as a dancer with a musical ministry.
One woman, who didn’t want to be identified, also knows Brother Baker and initially thought highly of him and his work.
"It’s like an anointing he has to touch people through his dance ministry, especially the kids because that’s the kind of dance he does," she said.
The woman said she knows the dark and disturbing secret Brother Baker himself surely never mentions in church or anywhere else—his interest in young boys like her 14-year-old son.
"He made him take his clothes off and he fondled him," she said.
The woman said it happened when she, a religious entertainment promoter herself, invited him to dance at one of her events in the fall 2 and a half years ago.
"I just followed my heart and I just didn’t believe, I trusted him. And I trusted him with my family," she said.
When the woman confided to other people, she said she learned it wasn’t Baker’s first transgression with young boys.
"That’s when the light came on, like okay, this is what happened because other younger boys came and said, ‘Well, your boy’s in there trippin’. He touched me inappropriately,’" she said.
The woman said the incident happened September 21 in front of church elders.
Baker admitted it almost immediately and repeated the confession in front of his parents and others from the church shortly thereafter.
The woman said she went to the police a couple of days later—though she claims the church folks pressured her not to, to let them handle it.
Baker was arrested, charged and sent to court in Ann Arbor where he confessed again and pleaded guilty to a charge of criminal sexual conduct in the fourth degree.
He got no jail time, but was put on 3 years probation, ordered to have no contact with children, told to register as a sex offender and complete a sex offender program.
He was ordered to stay away from schools and playgrounds, maintain his employment and to not leave the state of Michigan.
So imagine the surprise of his victim’s mother when she heard he was at a Detroit church still performing with children present.
She said church officials told Baker’s probation officers..."He was supervised, but then the probation said it didn’t matter if he was supervised he can’t perform."
Not long after, when the woman tuned in to the Soul Train music awards and there he was again—out in California, dancing on a program that included children in the building.
She alerted authorities and the judge amended the probation order to make it crystal clear.
Baker was "prohibited from performing or working" anywhere children are involved.
Recently, Action News shot undercover video at a Pontiac church and Baker admitted to an Action News intern, "I have a dance camp or a dance company that I teach from 8, I’m sorry, from 4 to 18."
At the Greater Immanuel Institutional Church where the victim’s mother insists he has been performing after the incident, Pastor Drew Sheard said, "He has not performed in our church since we got that information and I am emphatic, I am not making a mistake on that. I know that for a fact."
Sheard also said he has heard that Baker has been performing elsewhere.
The folks at St. James Missionary Baptist Church in Pontiac, where Action New caught him with a church full of children, said they had no idea about his background when an outsider brought him in to emcee a fundraiser.
Action News has no evidence that Baker’s continued association with children has resulted in additional assaults, but it’s clear he has no business anywhere near a child, yet will not stop.
Tonight at 11 we’ll show you what he had to say for himself when Chief Investigator Steve Wilson sat with him for some answers and found out exactly where he’s headed next.
We have to watch our children on every hand!!!
