A Tennessee teen girl who fled from home last month reportedly was scared for her life before she ran away. The girl’s adoptive dad, who allegedly owned numerous illegal guns, shot her dog dead and skinned its body, according to Wisconsin man Bryan David Rogers, who helped the girl escape.
According to court documents filed Monday at the U.S. Western District Court of Wisconsin and obtained by CrimeOnline, a 14-year-old girl was terrified of her 41-year-old adoptive father, Randall Lee Pruitt. The man is currently behind bars in Tennessee, accused of raping the girl.
The teen fled from her her Madisonville, Tennessee, home “on or around” January 14, with Rogers, 31, after she met him on the online gaming platform, Roblox. Rogers took the girl back to his mother’s house in Madison, where they stayed until authorities located her on January 31.
Police arrested Rogers and charged him with sexual exploitation after the girl allegedly sent him a cellphone video of Pruitt raping her in her bedroom.
Yet, court documents paint a different picture of Rogers. His lawyer claimed he encouraged the victim to send the videos as evidence only, since she was too scared to go to police on her own, fearing her father would kill her.
“KV (pseudonym) had good reason for her fear. Her adoptive father, KV told Rogers, was a convicted felon, who still possessed firearms. Not long before she left with Rogers, because her adoptive father was upset about something trivial, he shot KV’s dog, skinned it and left its body on the family property.”
“And, more recently, KV told Rogers that when a visitor came to the door, her adoptive father had pointed a shotgun at the person,” the court documents continued. “KV feared that if she went to the police, her adoptive father might be arrested, but he would be released, and her life would be in danger. Her fear was a filter that affected the manner in which both KV (and Rogers) made choices about what needed to be done to rescue KV.”
Although Rogers is behind bars facing felony charges, his attorney argued that his only intention was to get the girl out of a troubled home after she refused his advice to go to the police or a hospital.
Rogers allegedly convinced the girl to record her father raping her, but Rogers’ lawyer said his client had a “flawed understanding of the law,” while his intentions were good. He never harmed or sexually assaulted the girl, according to the court documents.
“He acted under a belief that he was acting in the minor’s s best interest to save her from her adoptive father’s continued sexual abuse……His purpose in obtaining the video recording was to obtain evidence that was to be used against the minor’s father and would allow for her to be safe.”
While with Rogers, the girl wrote a 6-page letter to the FBI and included an SD card that showed Randall abusing her. Rogers then drove the teen to the Missouri, where they mailed the package to the FBI’s St. Louis field office, then drove back to Wisconsin.
The pair reportedly didn’t know whether the FBI received the package or not, and when police arrived at Rogers’ home on January 31, he allegedly lied about the girl being there because he wasn’t sure whether she would be returned to her father. According to the court documents, Rogers didn’t know Pruitt had been arrested.
Rogers’ lawyer asked for him to be released from jail while awaiting preliminary trial. Rogers is scheduled for a court hearing Tuesday afternoon, at the U.S. District Court in Madison.
Check back with CrimeOnline for additional information.
[Feature Photo: Randall Pruitt/Police Handout]
