Kansas Democrat Adam Hamilton acknowledged during a contentious Senate debate Wednesday night that he made a “mistake” by failing to prevent a volunteer accused of sexual abuse in 2005 from attending a church retreat where he allegedly abused another boy.
Hamilton, a Methodist pastor who leads Kansas’ largest church, is facing a late-campaign assault from Republican Sen. Roger Marshall over the case involving Scott Moore, a now-convicted sex offender accused of molesting teenage boys at church retreats in 2005 and 2006.
The Democratic Senate candidate said an internal review of allegations made by two boys in 2005 was “inconclusive,” as was a subsequent police investigation. Even so, Hamilton said he now believes Moore should not have been permitted to return to the church the following year.
“I was actually preaching that weekend at Church of the Resurrection, and I did not sign off on him going back. I should have checked to make sure that he wasn’t going back,” Hamilton said.
“That was a mistake on my part. But I will tell you, when he was investigated the next year, we forbade him from working with youth or children anymore. He left our church angry and upset. And again, we played a critical role several years later in getting him arrested and convicted.”
Moore was convicted in 2013 of misdemeanor sexual battery after he inappropriately touched his son’s friend during a 2010 sleepover. Teenagers from Hamilton’s church who said Moore abused them in 2005 and 2006 testified at the trial.
In November 2005, a 15-year-old boy accused Moore of touching his penis, while a 14-year-old said Moore reached inside his sleeping bag during an overnight retreat.
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Prosecutors later said in court filings that the two victims gave church officials “detailed” accounts, but could not positively identify Moore at the time.
Moore returned as a church volunteer in November 2006 and was accused of inappropriately touching a 15-year-old boy. The church notified the Linn County Sheriff’s Office, but the county attorney’s office ultimately declined to file charges.
Hamilton told the Kansas Reflector in July that he would “absolutely” handle the matter differently in hindsight, while insisting that “there was no attempt at a cover-up.”
In an interview with CNN’s Jake Tapper on Tuesday, Hamilton said “it was not completely clear what had happened at the time [in 2005] and who exactly had done this thing.” He added that Moore “should have never been there [in 2006]” and described the events as “mistakes that were made.”
Marshall also responded to late-stage attacks against him, including reports that he had sued about 700 patients from his medical practice over unpaid medical bills.
Marshall said those legal actions were “out of our hands” after unpaid accounts were transferred to collection agencies. He argued that pursuing unpaid bills was the “same practice” used by other doctors and hospitals.
The Kansas Senate race remains tight, according to the latest polling. Hamilton has sought to portray himself as a moderate Democrat, criticizing former President Joe Biden’s border policies while distancing himself from the Democratic Party’s growing socialist wing.