Former pastor sentenced for assaulting boy

A former pastor from Clark County has been sentenced to 1 1/2 years in prison for sexually assaulting a boy he met on the Internet.

Dane County prosecutors say 51-year-old Ervin Witmer, of Owen, talked to the boy in an online chat room for gay teens and became aware that he had been sexually abused as a youngster by a relative. He then arranged to meet him at a Madison motel.

Witmer was a pastor at the Church of the Brethren in Stanley until 2011, when he became a district manager for a Christian book distributor. The State Journal says Witmer pleaded guilty in October to one count of second-degree sexual assault of a child. Two other counts were dismissed but considered at sentencing.