Ex-TV Anchor, Detroit City Council President Takes Deal on Sex Charges: Updated

Updated. DETROIT, MI — Former Detroit City Council president and television anchor and journalist Charles Pugh cut a deal Wednesday on criminal sexual conduct charges stemming from allegations that he had had sex with an underage minor boy in 2003 and 2004.

Pugh admitted to have sex with a minor, and agreed that he would serve at least five and one-half years an perhaps as many as 15 years in prison, according to media reports. The plea deal came during a pretrial hearing before Wayne County Circuit Judge Thomas Cameron. The deal means Pugh will avoid a public trial on three counts of criminal sexual conduct and two counts of third-degree criminal sexual conduct. Pugh, who is being held in a Wayne County jail on $150,000 cash bond, was scheduled for trial on Nov. 7.

The most serious charges were punishable by a maximum sentence of life in prison, and third-degree criminal sexual conduct is a 15-year felony.

Pugh will be sentenced on Nov. 9.

Pugh was a reporter and anchor for WJBK-TV in 2003 when prosecutors say he engaged in sexually inappropriate behavior with the 14-year-old who had inquired about an internship with the TV station. Prosecutors say the alleged inappropriate conduct didn’t occur at WJBK’s offices, but the teen visited Pugh’s Detroit apartment several times and the two communicated by phone and text messages, WDIV-TV reported.

The victim, who is now 27, testified earlier in the proceedings that he regarded Pugh as a mentor, the Detroit Free Press reported. The now-adult victim testified that he had inquired about the internship in March 2003, but a few months later, Pugh showed up his house and asked if he could work an assignment at the Martin Luther King Jr. anniversary march.

Together in the Pugh's car after the event, Pugh told him he had done a good job, then began to rub the victim's thigh as he drove, the man testified, adding, “I think I was in a little shock.”

The internship was never formalized, but Pugh’s accuser testified that he performed as an intern or assistant would and helped Pugh put together a desk at his house later that year. He offered graphic testimony about encounters that over time culminated in sexual intercourse.

The man testified that afterward, Pugh said “that was wrong” and asked him not to tell anyone what had happened. “Don’t tell anyone. I could get into really big trouble,” Pugh reportedly said. “Please don’t tell anyone.”

Pugh’s accuser was silent for years, but came forward last November after seeing reports about a high school student who accused Pugh of sexually grooming him during a mentorship program at Frederick Douglass Academy in Detroit.

He went to police, he said, after deciding he wasn’t going to let Pugh “do this to other kids,” according to the Free Press report.

During a hearing last week, Cameron ruled testimony would be allowed at trial from three other witnesses with “strikingly similar” stories about being groomed and solicited for sexual purposes by Pugh when they were teens.

“In each of these cases, there’s a proposition to a young adult in high school to have sexual contact,” Cameron said, adding that Pugh also allegedly asked for pornographic videos or pictures.

However, Pugh’s attorney, Delphia Burton, said allowing the three men to testify was “dangerous” and that the prosecution was mounting a smear campaign to damage Pugh’s character.

“We are saying that these individuals are not being forthright about what has happened,” Burton said.

Expected witnesses included current and former WJBK employees, including news director Kevin Roseborough and Pugh’s uncle, according to a witness list filed by prosecutors and obtained by the Detroit Free Press. Current and former Detroit City Council members and Detroit Public Schools officials also are on the list, but there is no indication the prosecution intended to call them to the witness stand.

Pugh parlayed his on-air personality to the second-most powerful position in Detroit city politics. He resigned from the TV station in March 2009 and was elected Detroit City Council president the following November. After missing four consecutive meetings in 2013, Pugh was stripped of his position as president and his pay by at-the-time emergency manager Kevin Orr. Pugh formally resigned in September 2013.

By that time, he was already embroiled in a sex scandal involving the high school student in the Frederick Douglass Academy. In a civil trial — there were no criminal charges — Pugh was ordered to pay a $250,000 judgment to the plaintiff.

Pugh fled Detroit, according to media reports, and only returned when he was extradited from New York to face the current criminal charges.

Official photo