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Former Boy Scout leader in York pleads guilty in molestation case

Johanna Somers, a member of The Virginian-Pilot newsroom staff, photographed October 2015. Steve Earley | The Virginian-PilotAuthor
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A former Boy Scout leader from York County pleaded guilty to taking “indecent liberties with a child by a person in custodial or supervisory relationship” on Thursday and was sentenced to three years in prison.

Thomas G. Seifert had been charged with 12 felony charges based on allegations that he molested three Scouts. None of the victims were present at the court Thursday, and Seifert said nothing after the plea deal was announced, said Assistant Commonwealth’s Attorney Krystyn Reid.

Seifert had the right to the preliminary hearing in Juvenile and Domestic Relations Court — at which prosecutors would have had to prove they had sufficient cause for the case against him. He waived that right, and the case went to grand jury. The grand jury indicted Seifert, and he pleaded guilty as expected.

Reid said it wasn’t in the victims’ best interest to have to go to trial.

“We consulted with each of the three victims and felt really strongly that it wasn’t in their best interest to have to testify, and they were all in agreement that this was the best way to resolve it.”

Seifert, 56, was sentenced to 60 years in prison. However, 57 years of the sentence were suspended, according to court records. A judge could order him to serve some or all of the suspended time if Seifert breaks the plea agreement.

Under the plea agreement, Seifert must have a psychosexual evaluation, have no contact with the victims, be under supervised probation and not violate any kind of law, Reid said.

If he fails to meet any of those terms, prosecutors could ask a judge that he serve the suspended portion of the sentence.

Reid also said that the state’s sentencing guidelines for this kind of a case were three to six months in prison.

Prosecutors asked a judge to exceed those guideline, and Seifert was sentenced to spend one year in prison for each of his victims.

“We really felt that the range of three to six months was inadequate for what these boys had gone through,” Reid said.

Seifert’s lawyer, Jeffrey C. Rountree, did not immediately return a phone call Thursday seeking comment on the sentencing.

The York-Poquoson Sheriff’s Office had initially filed 30 charges against Seifert, each accusing him of taking indecent liberties with a minor in a supervisory role.

An investigator said in court documents that massages were given to Scouts as either “punishment” for failing to complete merit badges or rewards for completing them. The Boy Scouts use the attainment of merit badges as a primary path toward advancement through the ranks, on the way to Eagle Scout.

In September, Deputy Commonwealth’s Attorney Donna Maw said that while 12 charges are moving forward, 18 identical charges were dropped by the prosecution in return for both the waiver of the preliminary hearing and the guilty plea expected in Circuit Court.

Until earlier this year, Seifert was the assistant Scoutmaster for Troop 226 in York.

Seifert, who had been a Boy Scout leader at a U.S. Air Force base in Okinawa, Japan, in the 1980s, was supposed to have been kicked out of the Boy Scouts for life in 1988 after a Scout accused Seifert of sexually abusing him six years earlier.

But Seifert began volunteering at the York troop about 10 years ago, with the Boy Scouts of America saying he was able to get back into the organization because the list of banned Scout leaders had his name spelled incorrectly as “Siefert.”

In the recent allegations, Seifert was accused of sexually abusing the Scouts in a shed at his Meadowfield Road home and a shed at Edgehill Pool, where Seifert also worked as a volunteer.

Daily Press reporter Peter Dujardin contributed to this story. Somers can be reached at 757-247-4758.