Bernard King, Ron Artest, Kenny Anderson, and Elton Brand; Some of The NBA Stars Produced by a Troubled Riverside Church Basketball Program
Ernest Lorch, founder of the Riverside Church basketball program in Harlem (which has produced several NBA stars), was arrested last week after failing to appear for an arraignment in a Massachusetts Court. Lorch, now 77, resides in a convalescent home in Westchester County, New York, and is reportedly in poor health. However, he now faces extradition to Massachusetts, due to allegations that he sexually assaulted a minor in approximately 1977-78.
During that time period, Lorch's Riverside Hawks team participated in a tournament in Massachusetts, where he allegedly sexually abused his seventeen year old victim. The indictment claims that Lorch also attempted to rape the victim, and charges him with indecent assault and battery of a person over 14 years of age, and attempted rape.
In Massachusetts, assault with the intent to commit rape carries a prison sentence of no more than twenty years. The statute of limitations on this crime is fifteen years. However, “any period during which the defendant is not usually and publicly a resident within the commonwealth shall be excluded in determining the time limited.” Thus, since Lorch left Massachusetts after the tournament, the clock was not ticking, so to speak.
Indecent assault and battery on a person over fourteen years of age, carries a prison sentence of no more than 5 years. Lorch also could have been charged with reckless endangerment of child. However, this is difficult to prove; since the act is alleged to have occurred more than 27 years ago, Massachusetts law requires independent evidence corroborating the victim’s allegations.
The victim, now approximately 50 years old, has never come forward with this occurrence, until recently.
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