Anger welled in Charlotte mom Crystal Nichole as she watched a North Carolina pastor’s sermon.
He would find a rape suspect not guilty if the victim wore shorts or a short dress, the Rev. Bobby Leonard of Bible Baptist Tabernacle in Monroe said in the sermon.
“If you dress like that and you get raped and I’m on the jury, he’s going to go free,” Leonard said in the sermon last summer that only recently circulated on social media.
“I was pissed,” Nichole, 34, said. “This is 2024.”
Beliefs ‘don’t fit in 2024’
Nicole said she was sexually assaulted in 2010 at age 20.
To highlight the falsity and absurdity of Leonard’s claim, Nichole said she was wearing blue jeans when she was attacked.
Nichole said she attended the church’s Tabernacle Christian School for three years. Her grandfather was good friends with Leonard, she said. Her family couldn’t afford the school, and Leonard let her attend for free.
“Pastor Leonard is a very good man,” she said. “He’s very strong in his convictions. But some of the things he believes in don’t fit into 2024.”
She said she’ll join a planned protest outside the church on Sunday morning with her 12-year-old daughter, Aubree Sapp. She hopes her daughter will learn “the importance of speaking out” against injustice, she said.
“A man’s a man”
“I told my wife, this is the kind of preaching we need,” Leonard said in his sermon, according to a recording of the sermon reviewed by The Charlotte Observer. “I told my wife, ‘Momma, when we go to Pigeon Forge, to the outlet mall here and sit in the parking lot, you’ll find more women going to have shorts on than pants and dresses put together.’”
“And you don’t like that, do you?” Leonard told his congregation after saying what he’d do as a juror in a rape case. “I’m right though, I can’t help you that I’m right, because a man’s a man.
“When I was a boy, 85 years ago, 80 years ago, I was raised in an apartment in Mocksville, North Carolina, I don’t remember women wearing anything but dresses,” Leonard said.
“I don’t want you to go home depressed tonight,” Leonard told his congregation, according to the recording. “I’d rather you go home encouraged, but I want you to go home wanting to serve God. But it seems like we pay no attention to God. Isn’t that right?”
Leonard didn’t reply to a message from the Observer on Friday left through the church website. The church voice mailbox was full, and the phone number doesn’t accept text messages.
Protest prompts apology
Wadesboro resident Jason King led a protest outside the church during its service on Wednesday night, Feb. 21. King posted a video on Facebook of the protest and plans a second one at 9:30 a.m. Sunday.
“You can’t stand behind a pulpit … and teach the word of God and claim that you believe it OK for people to go around raping people for what they wear,” King said.
“We got signs made up out here that say ‘Repent, Turn Back to God,’ and ’Matthew 7: 15-16,’” King said in the video. “A false prophet. How do you know a false prophet? You tell them by their fruits.
“We are fruit inspectors, and I’m telling you what he said behind the pulpit was not good fruits,” King said. “It was very unsettling and as a man behind the pulpit, it brings a reproach on God. And we’re out here tonight hoping that Bobby Leonard will repent.”
The protest prompted an apology from Leonard on a sign outside the church, Observer news partner WSOC reported.
“I am sorry for any hurt, I was wrong,” Leonard said on the message sign.
This story was originally published February 24, 2024, 9:55 AM.
