04/07/2008

By MATTHEW BARAKAT  / Associated Press

A daughter of a civil rights icon who served as a top lieutenant to Martin Luther King Jr. testified that her father regularly molested her beginning when she was just 6 years old.

The Rev. James L. Bevel went on trial Monday for incest in Loudoun County Circuit Court. If convicted, he faces up to 20 years in prison.

While the criminal charges revolve around a single incident that allegedly occurred in the early 1990s when the daughter was a teenager, Monday's testimony indicated a pattern of abuse.

The daughter said that she grew up in a communal lifestyle in which she regularly saw her father having sex with women and she came to perceive her own molestations as normal.

An ex-wife of Bevel also testified that Bevel instructed his family and followers in the commune that it was parents' obligation to "sexually orientate" their children — meaning in her mind that they were to have sex with them.

"I felt very repulsed by it," said the ex-wife, who is also the mother of the daughter who testified that she was molested.

The Associated Press generally does not identify the victims of sexual abuse. The daughter is one of at least 14 children Bevel has with several different women.

Bevel, 71, was a leading figure in the civil rights movement and was with King when he was assassinated 40 years ago. He also is credited with helping to conceive and organize the Million Man March.

In the 1960s, Bevel was a leader in the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) and the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), two of the stalwart organizations that led efforts to desegregate the South.

In the 1980s, Bevel became active in Republican Party politics and unsuccessfully ran for Congress in 1984.

He later became affiliated with political movements outside the political mainstream. In the late 1980s he supported causes affiliated with the Rev. Sun Myung Moon.

In 1992, he was vice presidential running mate to political maverick Lyndon LaRouche, who has a home in Loudoun County but at the time was in a federal prison for a tax conviction.

Prosecutors have said that incest occurred numerous times and in numerous places, but that charges were brought in Virginia because it does not have a statute of limitations for incest. Prosecutors also said in pretrial hearings that they have received calls from around the country since Bevel's arrest in June from women who claimed they were victimized by Bevel.

During opening statements, public defender Bonnie Hoffman urged jurors not to focus on Bevel's unconventional lifestyle, or whether he may have committed crimes other than the single incident for which he is charged.

"Get rid of your preconceived notions about how things should be," Hoffman said.

Prosecutor Gigi Lawless told jurors that the testimony "is going to be one of the most horrific things you've ever heard. ... This case is about betrayal."

The daughter testified about an unconventional life in which she and her siblings did not call Bevel "Dad" but instead referred to him as "Rev" or "Jim." She said she told her mother in a written letter that her father was molesting her.

The mother "handed (the letter back) to me and said I spelled 'molest' wrong," the daughter testified.

Circuit Court Judge Burke McCahill previously has ruled that much of Bevel's background as a civil rights leader is irrelevant and need not be discussed at trial.

Still, during jury selection a panel of more than 60 prospective jurors were asked if they had ever heard of Bevel. None had.

The daughter is expected to continue her testimony Tuesday.