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Alumni update:

Local Man Charged with Criminal Sexual Conduct
Ernie Lambert Editor


A Woodruff man confessed to First Degree Criminal Sexual Conduct with a Minor as the result of an investigation conducted earlier this month by the Woodruff Police Department.According to the incident report filed by Officers Mitzi Forrester and Douglas Jones, the mother of the victim, a four year old boy, brought her son to the police department on November 9th and stated that after she had picked the child up that day from the day care he attended, he had told her that “Josh” had “hit” him. When his mother asked where “Josh” had hit him, the boy responded “in his (privates).” The child had then told his mother of other sexual liberties that the man had taken with him.In the mother’s presence, and with her consent, Officer Forrester spoke with the child, who gave the officer the same account of the assault that he had given to his mother.Last Friday Woodruff Police Chief Jeff Wood detailed the steps his department had then taken in their investigation of this crime.“The man, Joshua Lee Bragg, a 24 year old resident of Woodruff, is a relative of the woman who runs a home-based day care center in the city. He actually lived in that home,” Wood stated. “After we took the mother’s statement, and after Officer Forrester had listened to the child’s account, we brought Bragg in, questioned him, and charged him with Assault and Battery. We charged him with that so we could hold him while we investigated the other charge, and, to be honest, for his own protection. It is human nature for any family to want to protect their young ones. I can understand that, but we have to follow the law.”“We then set up an appointment for the mother and her child with the Children’s Advocacy Center in Spartanburg,” Wood continued. “The people there interviewed the child, and at that point we moved ahead with our investigation. We set up a polygraph session with the suspect—he had agreed to take one when we had first brought him in—and then on November 11th, we executed a search warrant on the day care. In the suspect’s bedroom the officers discovered a lot of pornographic material, including videotapes, magazines, and a number of ‘fantasy letters’ that (Bragg) had written but undoubtedly had never mailed. Some of the letters were written to females with whom he had been acquainted, and we believe that some of them were ‘addressed’ to minors. On the 12th, Woodruff officers transported Bragg from the jail to the Sheriff’s Office where he was given a polygraph exam, which he failed. (Bragg) then made a voluntary confession in which he admitted molesting the child. He was subsequently charged with Criminal Sexual Conduct with a Minor, in addition to the prior charge of Assault and Battery. We have also initiated the process of having the day care’s license revoked.”The veteran police officer then spoke quietly about the effect that the investigation of such a crime has had on his department.“This type of case is not a routine situation for any of us,” Wood stated. “No matter how many bad things you may have seen in your law enforcement career, a case like this touches you hard. Day in and day out we deal with painful situations, but with many of those, we can rationalize it by saying that the people involved brought it on themselves, or, in the case of the victims, that they are old enough to deal with it to some extent. But a crime against a little child? That is another matter entirely. I hate—really hate—people who hurt children. We are all hurt by it, we can all relate to it. We think ‘what if it was my own child?’ It is just a hard, hard thing to deal with.”