Preacher sentenced in county’s oldest prosecuted rape case
The Shelby County District Attorney General’s Office has prosecuted its oldest rape case – a series of assaults of a 12-year-old girl that occurred in 1983.
Rufus Stevens Jr., a preacher, was sentenced Friday to 18 years in prison without the possibility of parole. Now 68 years old, he was convicted in December of aggravated rape.
In 1983, the crime was a Class X felony with no statute of limitations. It would now be classified as rape of a child, according to a news release from the district attorney general.
The crime was solved from a recorded telephone call in which Stevens admitted to his victim that he raped and sexually assaulted her repeatedly in the 1980s, according to the Shelby County District Attorney’s Office.
Stevens assaulted the young victim on several occasions in 1983, often in his car in Overton Park, according to court testimony. The victim’s grandmother caught Stevens molesting the child on a sofa inside of a family home on one occasion and yelled at Stevens to get off of her.
When the victim told her mother about the assaults, she was not believed and was instead beaten with a cord or a belt for lying, according to testimony.
In 2012, the victim spoke with Stevens by phone. He was remarried and living in Bakersfield, California, studying to be a pastor. The victim also spoke with Stevens’ wife, cautioning her to be careful with her grandchildren and their exposure to Stevens.
Stevens eventually admitted his crimes to the victim’s mother. He also eventually admitted his crimes to his new wife.
Katherine Burgess covers county government, religion and the suburbs. She can be reached at katherine.burgess@commercialappeal.com, 901-5292799 or followed on Twitter @kathsburgess.