Statesville, July 21 (AP)—Acquitted last night of charges of immorality, untruthfulness, and attempted bribery, Rev. Ashley Chappell, D.D., returned to Asheville to assume his duties as pastor of the fashionable Central Methodist Church.
Accompanying him were 70 members of his congregation who had come here for the trial before a church court of the western North Carolina Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church South. The came to Statesville to demonstrate their loyalty to Dr. Chappell, while the court decided he was guilty and should be dismissed from the pastorate, or innocent and returned as their minister.
When Dr. F.J. Prettyman of Gastonia, who presided at the trial, pronounced that the accused minister had not been found guilty, the members of his church who were present burst into cheers and gathered around their pastor and congratulated him upon his acquittal.
Then they sang “Praise God from Whom All Blessings Flow.”
Editor's Note: Rev. Chappell was attending a meeting in Tennessee. He stopped by an brothel to adjust his truss and the police raided the house and caught him with his pants down--quite literally. But he claimed he didn't know it was a brothel and he only got a room there to adjust his truss. Then he lied about his name. Even though the police had paperwork that proved he lied about his name and he admitted that he did so, the church court found him innocent on all charges. For the good of the church and Christianity. The court trial was closed to the public, of course.
From the front page of the Concord Daily Tribune, Wednesday, July 21, 1926
newspapers.digitalnc.org/lccn/sn92073201/1926-07-21/ed-1/seq-1/
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