Grooming & Predation In Missouri

Hawley, Hartzler campaigns accept donations from summer camp owner linked to sex abuse

Not just any summer camp. A summer camp for Jesus & Bible study.

Last month, Sen. Josh Hawley (R-MO) called child exploitation and sex trafficking an “exploding epidemic” in Missouri and around the country. Last year, he received the maximum individual donation allowed from a man accused of covering up child sex abuse.

Joe White runs Kanakuk Kamps, a collection of Christian summer camps near Branson, Mo. He has been accused of attempting to cover up rampant sexual abuse of children attending his camps during the 1990s and early 2000s.

The accusations found broad public attention after a 5,000-word investigative article by David and Nancy French, published on The Dispatch — a conservative-leaning online news magazine — last year.

The authors, in at times graphic detail, told the story of Pete Newman, one of Kanakuk Kamps’ directors from 1995 until 2009. During his tenure, he groomed and sexually abused, by his own admission, at least 57 young boys in the camps and on camp-sponsored trips.

Newman is currently serving a double life sentence, plus 30 years, for his crimes. The prosecutor on his case estimated the real number could be in the hundreds, the authors said.

While Newman’s abuse was ongoing, White and camp management seemingly turned a blind eye.

In a follow-up article, the Frenches say that during a 2012 deposition, White acknowledged he could have fired Newman after an incident where he rode a four-wheeler while nude with a camper. White chose not to fire him because one of Kanakuk’s primary measures of success “was the number of children the directors successfully encouraged to do Bible studies. Newman excelled at this metric,” according to the article’s authors.

Jesus. 

Fucking. 

Christ.