by Chris Peterson
Last week, on opposite sides of the country, two former theatre educators connected to youth and school theatre programs were sentenced in separate criminal cases involving child sexual abuse and exploitation.
In Louisville, Kentucky, Brian Hinds, a 52-year-old former teacher at duPont Manual High School, was sentenced to 12 years and seven months in federal prison, followed by 15 years of supervised release. Hinds had been a theatre teacher at Manual’s Youth Performing Arts School. He was sentenced on three counts of distribution and one count of possession of child pornography and was also ordered to pay $26,500 in restitution to the victims.
According to local news, investigators said Hinds sent images or videos to an undercover FBI agent on five occasions. Investigators also reported finding 3,326 images and 65 videos of child sexual abuse material on Hinds’ phone. The U.S. Attorney’s Office said Hinds admitted to sending and receiving child sexual abuse material through Telegram and told investigators he had viewed child pornography for decades.
Officials said there were no identified victims who were current or former Manual students.
In a separate case in California, David Hott, a former employee of the El Cajon-based Christian Youth Theater, was sentenced to three years of probation after pleading guilty to a felony count of committing lewd acts on a child. Hott was also ordered to register as a sex offender for life.
Prosecutors said Hott groped a 13-year-old student in his car in early 2007, when he was around 20 years old. The victim, now in her 30s, testified that Hott offered her a ride home from a dinner attended by other Christian Youth Theater employees and students, pulled the car over, and sexually abused her. Though the charges against Hott were tied to the incident in the car, she also testified that he touched her inappropriately on multiple occasions until she was 15 and sent her graphic sexual texts and voicemails.
Hott is one of several former Christian Youth Theater employees accused in either criminal or civil proceedings of sexually abusing underage students. ABC 10News reported that another former CYT employee, Brad Christian Davis, pleaded guilty in 2022 to a sex crime involving a teenage girl and was sentenced to two years of probation. A civil lawsuit against the organization remains pending, alleging sexual abuse by several adults employed by CYT between 1991 and 2011 and accusing CYT leadership of concealing abuse.
There is not much to say here except this: good. Good that both men have been punished.
Hopefully, neither of them is ever allowed to step inside a theatre, rehearsal room, classroom, youth program, backstage area, or any space where young performers are supposed to feel safe again.
The reminder here should be obvious, but apparently it still needs saying. Every theatre group, school, youth program, and community arts organization working with young people needs to have real vetting procedures in place.
That means background checks, reference checks, clear reporting policies, and adults in leadership who take concerns seriously the first time they are raised.
The safety of young performers cannot depend on someone’s reputation, charm, résumé, or how long they have been around the program. It has to depend on actual safeguards.