Charges Dismissed Against Pawleys Island Church Leaders

A South Carolina judge has dismissed all criminal charges against the former leaders of Pawleys Island Community Church, ending the criminal case that grew out of the church letting a convicted sex offender volunteer around children at its school. Georgetown County Chief Magistrate Judge Anthony Love dismissed the charges on Friday, November 6, 2026, after a preliminary hearing, finding that the testimony did not provide sufficient evidence of wrongdoing.

At the center of the case was Warren Perry, a 70-year-old registered sex offender. Perry had been convicted of sexual exploitation of a minor and placed on probation in 2023. In July, authorities learned he was serving as a volunteer custodian at Pawleys Island Christian Academy, the school that shared a campus with the church, and arrested him. His volunteer work at the academy reportedly violated the terms of his probation.

Pawleys Island Community Church charges dismissed by Judge Anthony Love

Judge Love dismissed every charge against every defendant after hearing testimony from the officer who obtained the arrest warrants and cross-examination by defense attorneys. The charges had included obstruction of justice, criminal conspiracy, and unlawfully placing a child at risk. Love found that the conduct described in the hearing simply did not meet the legal elements of those crimes.

Erin Bailey, the attorney for former academy director Jennifer Niki Howard, put it plainly to WMBF News. Every single crime has specific elements, she said, a specific checklist of things that need to happen, and in this case the conduct just did not meet the elements of the crimes they were charged with. The South Carolina Attorney General's Office confirmed the dismissal on November 6, saying the magistrate had found insufficient probable cause to proceed.

Warren Perry Pawleys Island probation agency knew he volunteered

Bailey told WMBF that the probation agency knew Perry volunteered at the church and that it had a preschool. She said the agency had done a site visit to the church, so it was very well aware of the setup. She added that agency staff had met with Pastor Don Williams and given him guidelines under which Perry could continue to volunteer as a groundskeeper at the church, and that those guidelines were followed.

South Carolina church criminal charges July arrests

The arrests in July had shocked the small coastal community. Then-pastor Don Williams, his wife Virginia Lee Williams, academy director Jennifer Niki Howard, and the church's director of operations, Michael Anthony Fields, were arrested on charges that a convicted sex offender had been allowed access to the daycare and school. The church's security director was also arrested.

Williams and Howard were charged with obstruction of justice, taking steps to place children at risk, and criminal conspiracy. Virginia Williams was charged with obstruction of justice and criminal conspiracy, while Perry was rearrested and received new charges of obstruction of justice and criminal conspiracy. Fields was charged with unlawfully placing a child at risk or causing a child harm. All three of the church's top figures resigned from their leadership positions as the backlash grew.

What the dismissal does not decide

The criminal dismissal is not the end of the legal story, and it is important to be clear about what it does and does not mean. The judge did not rule that nothing wrong happened at the church or the academy. He ruled that the evidence presented at a preliminary hearing did not amount to the specific criminal charges that had been filed.

The civil cases are a different matter. The church was sued multiple times, including a 25 million dollar class-action suit filed in state court in July on behalf of all students who attended the academy in the past six years. Another lawsuit accuses Perry of abusing a student at the academy. A third names the probation agency as a defendant, alleging it failed to enforce restrictions meant to keep Perry away from minors. Those cases were still pending when the criminal charges were dismissed. Questions of safeguarding in churches have run through the news all year, from the survivors who met Pope Leo in Argentina, as reported in Pope Leo Meets Five Abuse Survivors in Argentina, to the governance fight in the Church of England, as covered in Liberals Fall Short in Church of England Synod Vote, and the revival movement in America, as reported in Steven Andrew Launches 40-Day Revival for America Nov 7.

What happens next for Pawleys Island Community Church

For the congregation itself, the path forward is still being drawn. The academy is closed. The children's ministry has reopened with new safeguards. The leaders who were arrested have already stepped down, and the church has apologised for the hurt the revelations caused. What it has not yet had is a full public accounting of how a convicted sex offender came to be volunteering on a campus with children, and who knew what, and when.

But the most surprising part of this story is yet to come — keep reading.