How ReVille committed his crimes over a decade, and how he was finally caught

Image by Staff illustration Of the 35 boys ReVille admitted to molesting, 12 have chosen to remain anonymous.

(Updates at the bottom.)

Former teacher, basketball coach, Bible leader, and principal Louis "Skip" ReVille plead guilty in Charleston County court on Wednesday to charges of child sexual abuse and was sentenced to 50 years.

That headline and the headlines about ReVille's crimes are well known — less well known is the story behind the crimes and how ReVille went a decade, molesting some 35 boys, without being caught.

Paul Bowers, writing for the Charleston City Paper, sheds much light on that angle: 

Skip ReVille never forced himself on any boys, as far as the court can tell. Instead, the story the boys told — often haltingly, and sometimes only through nods of the head as detectives questioned them — was the story of a master manipulator. Many of them spoke about The Club, a group that often met at ReVille's house in Hanahan and engaged in a variety of bizarre initiation rites and sexual rituals. John Doe 1 said ReVille called it a fraternity, and its rites "made him feel really cool," according to Herring-Lash. They played the Flinch Game, where ReVille ran his hand up boys' thighs to see how long they could go without reacting. At a church lock-in, boys were made to masturbate and run around stark naked. Mr. ReVille would offer transportation for the boys, then he would open his glove compartment, take out a tube of personal lubricant, and encourage them to masturbate while he drove. ReVille fondled boys to erection, licked chocolate syrup off of their penises, and convinced them to lick peanut butter off of his own penis. 

That 180 word snippet is just a small part of the 3,600-word piece; read it all over here.

Update July 17: It's been a month since the Charleston City Paper profile of ReVille's actions, but ABC News 4 has reprinted portions of an e-mail that ReVille wrote to the some of the parents of boys he was convicted of sexually abusing.

In part: 

In the first paragraph Reville writes it all started as "simple locker room fun among boys" then blew out of proportion. He recalls playing games with the boys, like the "credit card" game, which he describes as finger up the backside, and the "points game", which he described as flashing each other for competition. Reville writes the boys were still clothed during those games. However, he went on to write he only played the "flash game" on occasion but, usually talked himself out of it saying "mine was too large to take out".

Read the station's report here.

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