A convicted pedophile was killed in jail after admitting to assaulting nine youngsters at a weekend religious event. Cesar Pastrana, a 33-year-old Mexican native and convicted child molester, was murdered in prison eight years into his life sentence for many crimes of child molestation. Pastrana was slain in a struggle with another inmate in Hancock State Prison in Sparta, Georgia, according to Georgia officials, according to the Daily Mail. Pastrana volunteered at a school and a church before his incarceration. He was apprehended a few days after a weekend-long religious “lock-in” at a private Cobb County home.
‘Medical personnel was dispatched, and life-saving procedures were carried out.’ He was taken to a local hospital, where a medical physician pronounced him dead at 12:15 p.m.’ Pastrana was initially detained in February 2012, days after a weekend-long ‘lock-in’ event held by the city’s NorthStar Church, where he served as a volunteer, according to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Pastrana was sentenced to life in prison in Sparta’s Hancock State Prison (seen above). In court, he acknowledged assaulting multiple minors in 2011.
According to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, the event was hosted by the city’s NorthStar Church, where Pastrana volunteered with youngsters. He was accused of making inappropriate contact with multiple juveniles who attended the event, as well as an event hosted at his residence the prior year. Another adult at the church’s “lock-in” was informed that Pastrana had abused youngsters at an event hosted at his house the year before, and he was fired from his position by the church almost immediately after the charge, but it was too late. Pastrana reportedly inflicted bodily damage to a 14-year-old child while assaulting him at his house the year prior, according to an arrest warrant.
Pastrana was charged with four charges of aggravated child molestation, one act of aggravated sodomy, and ten counts of child molestation involving nine males under the age of 16 in a 15-count indictment that included occurrences dating back to 2007. The most recent incident happened just days before his incarceration. Two of the nine youngsters he reportedly targeted were his relatives who shared his home. He met the other seven through the church. Cesar Pastrana rejected the allegations at first, but eventually pled guilty to several counts of aggravated child molestation, aggravated sodomy, and child molestation involving several boys, according to the Marietta Daily Journal.
He acknowledged a slew of crimes, many more than the children had claimed. Pastrana, who was 25 years old at the time, was given a life sentence. The pedophile was sentenced to a minimum of 30 years in prison before being eligible for release. Pastrana was set to be deported if he was ever granted parole. He would, however, not survive to see that day. Instead, Pastrana’s life sentence was just 8 years long until it was commuted to death when he was slain in a prison brawl with a fellow inmate. According to a representative for the Georgia Department of Corrections, his death is being investigated as a homicide.
“Agents have cause to think that Cesar Pastrana died as a consequence of injuries received during a confrontation with another inmate,” GDC said in a statement, adding that the death was being investigated as per usual protocol. “Medical staff arrived and performed life-saving procedures. He was taken to a nearby hospital, where he was declared dead.” Cobb County Schools did not release the facts of Pastrana’s dismissal from Barber Middle School as a volunteer two years prior to his arrest, however, Cobb police verified it.
According to Reverend Mike Linch, he was still able to pass a background check before serving at NorthStar, despite church policy prohibiting volunteers from being alone with a kid “during NorthStar time.” Although the GDC provided no explanation for the altercation with the other inmate, Pastrana’s death was the third reported killing of a convicted child molester in a California prison in less than two months, after 41-year-old Jonathan Watson admitted to beating and killing two convicted child molesters in a California prison using another inmate’s cane just months before.
Watson said he attacked one man who was viewing children’s television on a community TV, then beat a second man, convicted of child abuse, to death as he tried to locate a correctional official to give himself in. “I observed a known kid trafficker when I went to the lowest tier, and I felt I’d simply do everyone a favor,” Watson told the Mercury News. He added, “In for a penny, in for a pound.” In a statement to the news organization, Watson added, “Being a lifer, I’m in a unique situation where I sometimes have access to these folks and I have so little to lose.” “And believe me when I say that these folks are every parent’s worst fear.”
These families spend years methodically and articulately preparing how to provide every chance that they never had for their children, just for one monster to appear and ruin that child’s trajectory forever.” Even among offenders who include drug traffickers, murderers, thieves, and more, as Robert Hood, a retired prison warden who spent three years in command of the federal Supermax prison in Florence, Colorado, put it, “the guy at the bottom of the totem pole,” so to speak, “is the sex offender.” These are the lowest of the low, which may explain why we all experience a feeling of satisfaction when they get the punishment they deserve in the form of old-fashioned jail justice.
Important Disclaimer: This story is a little out of date, and it’s been updated.
Does anyone else ever notice the poor quality of writing in articles these days? Especially when it comes to smaller online articles. Just poor writing quality.