Matthew Lane Durham will be spending a lot of time pondering whether the sexual assault of four orphans in Kenya was truly “God’s plan” for him.
It began in April 2014, when Durham traveled to a children’s home outside of Nairobi as a volunteer. He was only 19, but it was reportedly his fourth time volunteering since junior high school. This trip, however, would change everything. Durham reportedly told the court that during his time in Kenya, he began to believe was possessed by a demon. He’d even given that demon a name: Luke.
He believed Luke was the one who had been assaulting the children,because Matthew never would have done such a thing. Still, he repeatedly told the court he didn’t rape any of the children, in direct contradiction to a videotaped confession.
In June 2015, a jury convicted Durham of seven of the eight illicit sexual conduct charges at trial, but the judge stepped in and acquitted him on three of those charges in January 2016. The judge in that instance stated that the prosecutors had failed in their attempts to establish sexual contact between Durham and those victims. In the four counts for which Durham was convicted, the children involved were all between the ages of 5 and 14. Three were girls, and one was a boy. When Durham was finally sentenced, he told the court, “all I wanted was to follow God’s plan for me.”
He was sentenced to a total of 40 years in prison — plenty of time to consider God’s plan! — and ordered to pay $15,863.23 in restitution.
The judge also ordered that if he is ever released, Durham would be on supervised release for the rest of his life.
Durham and his lawyer are planning an appeal, as he continues to assert his innocence.
Read more:
KFOR on the trial
The Oklahoman/NewsOK
CNN
KFOR on the sentencing
Sentencing Documents in the case
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