Ex-Liberty professor’s sex charge advances

A judge ruled Wednesday that there was enough evidence in the case against a former Liberty University professor accused of sexual misconduct with a student to send the charges forward to a grand jury for consideration.

Joshua Young Moon was fired from Liberty after being charged in April with object sexual penetration by incapacity or physical helplessness.

Moon, who ran into and out of the court building in an apparent attempt to dodge television cameras, closed his eyes through much of the hearing.

The student, a rising senior, testified Moon taught a statistics course required for her psychology major. She said she had talked with him about chronic pain she suffered as a result of a September car wreck and that he offered to give her pressure-point massages.

She took him up on the offer, she said — twice at her apartment and twice in his office. She called them “a blessing,” since they effectively took her pain away.

At the first massage, she testified, Moon tried to pull down her pants and she told him that was unacceptable. She also testified she declined his offer once to meet him at his hotel room for a massage.

On April 21, she testified, she went to Moon’s office to finish taking an exam she was unable to complete in the allotted time. Afterward, she said, he offered to give her a brief massage and she accepted.

She said she fell asleep during the massage because she had stayed up all night studying and had only slept for four hours the night before that. She awoke to find him touching her inappropriately, she testified.

She cried during her testimony, saying she had never been touched that way and was saving herself for marriage. She said the incident was especially painful because she trusted Moon as a Christian and as a professor at Liberty.

Moon’s lawyer, Randy Trost, asked the woman if anyone had told her that getting massages from her professor was inappropriate. She replied that her fiancé and roommates, although they were out of the home during both massages there, knew of the encounters, but didn’t say if anyone objected.

After testifying that she frequently sought help from the professor because she was struggling with the course, Trost asked if she considered Moon’s practice of giving her hints on exam questions and extra time to take tests with him in his office as favors.

“Not really,” she said.

LU Police Department Investigator Craig Sasser testified he interviewed Moon in the days after the incident and suggested Moon write an apology letter.

“I’m sorry I touched the most sacred part of your body,” Sasser said, reading from the letter.

Moon, of Durham, N.C., is free on a $25,000 secured bond.

The grand jury is next scheduled to meet on July 6.