Jack Wayne Rogers: Charges, Sentencing, and Branson Perry Case

Jack Wayne Rogers is a convicted child pornographer and unlicensed surgeon from Fulton, Missouri, who is serving a 30-year federal prison sentence imposed in 2004 for child pornography and obscenity offenses, along with concurrent state sentences for performing an illegal castration in a hotel room. He is also the prime suspect in the 2001 disappearance of 20-year-old Branson Perry from Skidmore, Missouri, though he has never been charged in that case.¹²

The Federal Child Pornography Case

Rogers came to federal attention through Operation Candyman, an FBI undercover investigation into an online group used to trade child pornography.³ A sealed indictment was returned by a federal grand jury in Jefferson City on April 5, 2003, and agents arrested him five days later at his Columbia employment agency, Deck and Decker Employment Service.⁴

Searches of his home and business turned up at least 860 images of child pornography on computers and storage devices, along with evidence that he had distributed obscene material. Rogers pleaded guilty to an 11-count indictment: two counts of possession of child pornography under 18 U.S.C. § 2252(a)(4)(B), five counts of distribution of child pornography under 18 U.S.C. § 2252(a)(1), and three counts of distribution of obscene materials under 18 U.S.C. § 1462.¹

In April 2004, a federal district court in the Western District of Missouri sentenced him to 360 months. That is five times the 57-to-71-month range the federal sentencing guidelines recommended for the offenses of conviction.⁵ The Eighth Circuit affirmed the 30-year sentence on appeal, finding Rogers had waived his right to jury fact-finding in his plea agreement and that uncharged conduct could properly inform the departure.¹

The Illegal Castration and State Charges

The federal investigation uncovered conduct unrelated to the pornography charges. Rogers had been performing unlicensed surgical procedures he called “gender nullification,” and he told at least one person he had carried out more than a hundred such castrations and penectomies.¹

One of those procedures nearly killed its subject. Michael Abercrombie testified that he paid Rogers $750 for a four-hour operation in a Columbia, Missouri, hotel room in October 2002. Using only local anesthetics, Rogers removed Abercrombie’s penis, scrotum, and testicles. Abercrombie bled profusely, and a urologist later testified he would have died without emergency medical treatment. Investigators also found evidence that Rogers kept and consumed severed body parts.¹

In September 2004, Rogers pleaded guilty in Missouri state court to first-degree assault and practicing medicine without a license. He received 17 years on the assault count and 7 years on the unauthorized medical practice count, both running concurrently with the federal sentence.⁶

Why the Sentence Was So Far Above the Guidelines

The district court departed sharply upward because of what the record showed outside the counts of conviction: the pattern of unlicensed surgical procedures, the evidence of cannibalism, and Rogers’ own stated history of violence against children. On appeal, the Eighth Circuit held that the sentencing guidelines allow a judge to consider “any information concerning the background, character and conduct of the defendant,” which made the uncharged conduct a legitimate basis for the departure.¹

Suspect in the Branson Perry Disappearance

Branson Perry, a 20-year-old from Skidmore, Missouri, was last seen leaving his home on April 11, 2001.⁷ Rogers became a central figure in that case through the same Operation Candyman investigation that led to his arrest.

When investigators seized a computer belonging to an Alabama man caught up in the operation, they found graphic chat logs between the Alabama man and Rogers. In those conversations, Rogers described picking up, torturing, and killing a young hitchhiker, with personal details that authorities believed could only refer to Perry.²

Searches of Rogers’ property followed. Cadaver dogs detected biological material at a travel camper, and authorities seized cushions, a backpack, and other items for DNA testing.⁸ A leather necklace with a turtle claw was recovered from Rogers’ van, and Perry’s father identified it as his son’s.²

During a 2005 interview, Rogers denied any knowledge of Skidmore or Perry. Shown the chat transcripts describing the killing, he responded, “It appears that I may have been playing a game with someone,” and then asked for an attorney.²

Rogers has never been charged in connection with Perry. Investigators have cited the difficulty of distinguishing online fantasy from fact and of proving a homicide without a body.⁹ The case is now classified as a homicide investigation, with the FBI assisting the Nodaway County Sheriff’s Office.¹⁰

The 1992 Conviction and the Presbyterian Church Lawsuit

Rogers’ first child pornography conviction came in 1992, and he served roughly four months in prison before returning to Fulton.⁴ After his release, the First Presbyterian Church of Fulton appointed him a lay minister serving the Presbyterian Church of Bellflower in Montgomery County, Missouri.¹¹

In the summer of 2000, Rogers chaperoned a group of area teens at the Connection 2000 Youth Conference, a national Presbyterian gathering outside Baltimore. Kristopher D. Schondelmeyer, then 17, later alleged that Rogers sexually assaulted him during the conference. A Maryland criminal referral in 2013 was declined because the statute of limitations had run.¹¹

Schondelmeyer, by then an ordained Presbyterian minister, filed a civil lawsuit in April 2014 in the 13th Judicial Circuit Court in Callaway County, Missouri. The suit named Rogers, the First Presbyterian Church of Fulton, presbytery director Bruce W. Berry, the Missouri Union Presbytery, the Synod of Mid-America, and several national Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) entities. It alleged negligent supervision, sexual abuse and battery, intentional and negligent infliction of emotional distress, and conspiracy to commit fraud, with the core claim that officials knew of Rogers’ 1992 conviction when they placed him in authority over minors.¹¹ The case settled later in 2014 for $35,000, along with non-monetary provisions that included an independent investigation into how Rogers had been approved as a chaperone.¹² The investigative panel confirmed the abuse and found that presbytery officials had been warned about the risks before approving him.¹³

Where Rogers Is Now

As of 2014, Rogers was incarcerated at the Federal Correctional Institution in Miami, serving his 30-year federal sentence with the 17-year assault and 7-year unauthorized-medicine sentences running concurrently.¹⁴ No public reporting indicates any change in that status.

1
FindLaw. United States v. Rogers, No. 04-2563
2
Police1. Convicted Child Pornographer at Center of Search for Missing Man
3
FBI. Operation Candyman
4
Poynter. Fulton Man Arrested on Child Pornography Charges Again
5
Missourinet. Fulton Resident Sentenced to 30 Years for Sex Crimes
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St. Louis Public Radio. Man Pleads Guilty in Botched Sex Change Case
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KQ2. Reward for New Info on Branson Perry Case Offered by Brother
8
Columbia Missourian. New Evidence Surfaces in Kidnapping Case
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Maryville Forum. Laying Out the Evidence After Renewed Interest in Branson Perry Case
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NewsNation. FBI Investigating Missouri Cold Case Branson Perry
11
Fulton Sun. Fulton’s First Presbyterian Named in Lawsuit
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Presbyterian Outlook. On the Way to GA: Building #MeToo Accountability Into PCUSA Policy
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Presbyterian Outlook. A Letter to Church That I Love
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Bishop Accountability. Presbyterian Church Sued Over Abuse by Convicted Pornographer