Ex-choir leader
at Prayer Mountain Community Church is guilty of 23 offenses involving two minors
By Ryan Lillis - Bee Staff Writer
Joel Natividad, a former singer in an El Dorado County church choir and employee of an Orangevale group home, was convicted Monday of nearly two dozen charges, ranging from lewd and lascivious acts with a child younger than 14 to unlawful sexual intercourse with a minor.
Natividad, 46, will be sentenced Jan. 19 and faces up to 45 years in prison. He was convicted on all 23 counts against him.
Authorities said Natividad met one of his victims in 1998, when he was helping to lead the choir at Prayer Mountain Community Church, a Pentecostal church that was once located near Rescue.
After building a trusting relationship with the 12-year-old girl, he became "an opportunistic predator," groping and eventually having sex with her at least 55 times over the next two years, Deputy District Attorney Caryn Dubke said during the trial's closing arguments last week. Dubke said Natividad told the young girl that "God designed them to be together" and that he loved her.
Natividad was also convicted of having sex with a 17-year-old resident of the Stanford Home for Children last year. Natividad worked at the home and, in the early morning hours of Sept. 13, 2005, got into the girl's bed and had sex with her, Dubke said.
The girl from the church case said she came forward after reading about Natividad's arrest following the group home attack.
