By DON FLETCHER
News Staff Writer
Local charges are still pending the outcome of an investigation into allegations that a Monroeville preacher, who also has an Atmore church, committed sexual offenses against at least one child here. That’s not the case in the preacher’s home county.
According to sources in Monroeville, Monroe County Sheriff’s Office investigators arrested Garyl Jermaine Gibbs, 47, last week on warrants accusing him of four more counts of first-degree sodomy and two more counts of second-degree sodomy.
Gibbs, who is pastor of Call to Life Apostolic Church in Monroeville and on Alabama 21 in Atmore, was charged in February with one count of first-degree sodomy and two counts of second-degree sodomy.
The preacher is reportedly free after total bonds of $750,000 ($150,00 on each of the first-degree charges and $75,000 on the second-degree charges) were posted on his behalf.
The investigation into the pastor’s alleged sexual misconduct was launched in Atmore and led to an indictment that asserts Gibbs “engaged in deviant sexual intercourse with another person who was less than 16 years of age but older than 12 years of age,” and that at least twice he “engaged in deviant sexual intercourse with another person by forcible compulsion.”
Atmore Police Chief Chuck Brooks said this week that the local case against Gibbs is ongoing but has been slowed by the COVID-19 pandemic and the busy schedule of federal prosecutors.
“The cases here are still pending,” Brooks said. “Our investigator was supposed to meet with a federal prosecutor in Mobile, but the coronavirus kept that from happening, then the prosecutor had a case in federal court. We’re still working it, but nothing new has come up yet.”