Middlesex County Prosecutor Andrew C. Carey, Chief Raymond Hayducka of the South Brunswick Police Department and Director Kenneth McCormick of the North Brunswick Police Department announced today that a youth minister at a church in Franklin Township has been arrested and charged with sexually assaulting two teenage girls in separate incidents.
Shawn Butler, 48, of Hillsborough was arrested at a relative’s home in Millsboro, Del. by members of the Delaware State Police Troop 7 on April 3, 2015.
He was arrested after he was charged with one count of sexual assault and two counts each of criminal sexual contact and endangering the welfare of a child.
Butler was released from custody in Delaware after posting $50,000 bail and is scheduled to surrender to authorities in New Jersey on May 1.
Bail in New Jersey has been set at $300,000.
Butler was charged after Detective Mark Morris of the Middlesex County Prosecutor’s Office and Detective Roger Tuohy of the South Brunswick Police Department determined that the defendant sexually assaulted a 16-year-old girl in North Brunswick on various occasions between July 2012 and August 2013.
The detectives also charged that Butler improperly touched a 15-year-old girl in South Brunswick and in Hillsborough on a number of occasions between March 2014 and June 2014.
Police began an investigation after the 15-year-old victim contacted the South Brunswick Police Department last July.
During the investigation, it was determined that Butler had been working as a youth minister at the Eternal Life Christian Center in the Somerset section of Franklin Township and served on the church’s executive board at the time of the sexual assaults.
The investigation is active and is continuing.
Anyone with information is asked to call Detective Mark Morris of the Middlesex County Prosecutor’s Office at (732) 745-4194, or Detective Roger Tuohy of the South Brunswick Police Department at (732) 208-4896.
According to court records, Butler plead guilty in December 1990 to seven years in state prison to a sexual assault charge that occurred in December of 1989.
Butler also plead guilty on a criminal sexual contact charge that occurred on February 1988.