Man Convicted of Molesting Girls Through his Father's Lake Forest Church

The son of a former Lake Forest church pastor was convicted today of molesting two girls whose families he befriended through his father’s congregation.

Branden Edward Shumate, 37, of Koloa, Hawaii, was found guilty of three felony counts of lewd acts on a child younger than 14. Jurors also found true a sentence-enhancing allegation of multiple victims, according to Deputy District Attorney Kristin Bracic.

The first girl was first molested in the summer of 1997, when she was 6 years old and the defendant was 18. Shumate worked as an assistant in the church at the time.

The girl’s mother dropped her daughter off at the church for a field trip to a water park. Shumate sexually assaulted the girl with his finger while waiting for the other girls going to the water park to arrive, Bracic said.

The same victim was again molested in September 2003 while the defendant was helping the then-12-year-old girl’s family move, the prosecutor said. While driving the girl in a separate vehicle behind the moving truck, he pulled over and forced the victim to perform oral sex on him, according to evidence presented at his trial.

The victim confided in a relative and friend in 2006 after Shumate tried to contact her again, prosecutors said. Riverside County sheriff’s deputies initially investigated and then sent the evidence to Orange County sheriff’s deputies.

The other victim was 10 years old. Between August 2010 and March 2011, while living with the defendant’s family, Shumate sexually assaulted her as she dried off following a shower. The girl told her mother what had happened in August 2011 after her family had moved to Alaska, prosecutors said.

Shumate, who is scheduled to be sentenced on March 25, could face up to 45 years to life in prison.

City News Service