DEL.ICIO.USWoodstock man, 74, gets 25 years for molesting grandkids
Case has divided his family
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Thursday, January 08, 2009
The scene in the Cherokee County courthouse late Thursday told the saga of a family and community ripped apart by child molestation.
The defendant, 74-year-old Cecil Henderson Jr. of Woodstock, maintained his innocence, even as he was being handed what’s likely to be a life sentence — 25 years in prison.
Cherokee County Sheriff's Department
The 25-year prison term Cecil Henderson faces amounts to a life sentence, his lawyer said.
“I can’t say I’m sorry because I didn’t do it,” said Henderson, who was convicted last September of molesting his granddaughter from the age 7 to 9, and a grandson, from age 3 to 5.
His son and daughter-in-law — now estranged from most of their large family — pleaded for justice for their children.
“I just ask that, for the crimes he’s committed, he get the maximum,” said son Brett Henderson, the father of the two victims.
“He has no idea what he’s done to those kids,” said Brett Henderson’s wife, Jennifer. “He’s destroyed us.”
Assistant District Attorney Holly Varner, who prosecuted the case, asked that the victims and community be protected and that a message be sent to child abusers.
“He needs to be punished swiftly, severely and justly,” she said.
Defense attorney Ronnie Knighton of Marietta asked the judge to consider the minimum sentence possible — 10 years in prison — saying, “I think any sentence that the court imposes is going to be a life sentence.”
Henderson, a former home remodeler and well-known member of First Baptist Church of Woodstock, was convicted of 15 felony counts for molesting two of his grandchildren, each over a period of about two years. He faced a potential 200-year sentence.
Superior Court Judge Jackson Hill, who presided over the trial, followed the prosecution’s recommendation and sentenced Henderson to 25 years in prison. “It’s unlikely the tears you’ve ripped into your good and decent family will be mended for some time, if ever,” the judge told him.
Security was ramped up for Thursday’s sentencing hearing, in part, because of bitter feelings among some of Cecil Henderson’s seven sons over the conviction.
Cecil Henderson’s wife did not attend the sentencing, but several of his children and friends did.
The judge said he’d received letters from many of Henderson’s former church members, a good number of whom believe in his innocence.
“Now this community you lived in and deceived, they’ll have to fight disillusionment,” Hill said.
At trial, the jury heard evidence that Cecil Henderson would often have the two grandchildren to his house to spend the night and would slip into their beds or corner them in the bathroom.
The granddaughter confided in an older sister in 2006. The Woodstock police were asked to investigate, and charges were filed against Cecil Henderson.
A niece from Ohio testified that Cecil Henderson had molested her more than 40 years ago.
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