Testimony: Local boys weren’t the only ones ex-GBI agent had inappropriate contact with

Back before he was old enough to drive, a now 28-year-old man told jurors Wednesday that he and a youth leader from his church in Knoxville, Tennessee, negotiated a way for him to get a free meal at Hooters.

To get the meal, the teenager rode in the youth leader’s Ford Mustang naked from the waist down.

On another occasion, he wrote a name on his genitals and showed his artwork to the leader to get a “reward,” the man testified during the trial for the leader, former GBI agent Charles Woodall.

Woodall, 36, who went on to be a youth leader at Macon’s Northway Church, is charged with molesting three boys he met while working with youths in the Zebulon Road congregation and enticing them and another boy for indecent purposes.

Woodall became a GBI agent in 2011, but he resigned his post after being arrested on molestation charges in 2015.

He’s charged with six counts of child molestation, five counts of enticing a child for indecent purposes and one count of violating his oath of office. Testimony in his trial began Tuesday in Bibb County Superior Court.

Allegations against Woodall date from 2005 to 2014.

In his opening statement to jurors, Woodall’s lawyer, Charles Cox, said there’s no physical or electronic evidence linking Woodall to the crimes.

Two other 28-year-old men who knew Woodall as teenagers through their church in Knoxville testified Wednesday about their interactions with him.

One of the men said he was 14 when he slept over at Woodall’s home and Woodall showed him pornography.

Another man testified that he was 13 or 14 when he shared a hotel room with Woodall and two other boys on a church trip to Texas. While asleep in a bed with Woodall, the man said he awoke to feel Woodall’s hand on his genitals.

“I immediately rolled over and just wished that I wasn’t there,” the man said.

He said he felt “ashamed” and didn’t tell anyone what had happened.

“I didn’t want anyone to know,” he said.

Prosecutors finished presenting their case Wednesday, and the defense is set to begin Thursday.

This story was originally published August 30, 2017 at 5:44 PM with the headline "Testimony: Local boys weren’t the only ones ex-GBI agent had inappropriate contact with."