By Shayna Jacobs
DNAinfo Reporter/Producer
MANHATTAN SUPREME COURT — A Downtown church minister has admitted to raping five girls and was expected to receive a 22-year prison sentence, prosecutors said Monday.
Self-confessed child rapist Jeremy Fulton, 28, abused the girls — ages 10 to 16 — repeatedly and on church property at the Mariners' Temple Baptist Church on Henry Street, according to the DA.
He pleaded guilty Monday to first-degree rape and is expected to be sentenced to the lengthy prison term on May 20. He was arrested on these charges on Nov. 24, 2009, in Maryland and was extradited to New York, prosecutors said.
Four of the victims were girls he met while working on church programs for children. He was serving as the the associate director of the church's after-school and summer camp programs, prosecutors said.
"This defendant used his position of authority and respect to win the trust of parents and gain unfettered access to children for the purpose of sexually abusing these girls," Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance Jr. said in a statement Monday.
"Putting an offender like this in prison also saves other victims he might have preyed upon," the DA added.
