Incest Verdict Is Bittersweet For Daughter Of Minister

She said Bevel presided over daily 12-hour meetings in these "cultlike" houses, teaching his philosophy of sex, marriage and morality. Open sex and physical violence were the norm, she said.

She testified that she began drinking alcohol at 12 and became an alcoholic. She also smoked marijuana. And she became suicidal. "It was just an intense environment," she told the jury. "You didn't know when people would erupt."

As for sex with her father, she said, it was so routine, "I didn't feel there was necessarily anything wrong with it."

She said she didn't tell anyone because her father had taught her that "society was bad" and that police and school officials were not to be trusted.

But about five years ago, Mills said in the interview yesterday, she began speaking with her siblings about the abuse. She said she learned that at least four of her sisters had been molested by their father. Those discussions led to meetings in 2004 and 2005 at which Bevel was confronted.

Mills said she was motivated to disclose the abuse after her father had a child with his current wife. Along with her siblings, she said she worried he would abuse that child, too.

"We said, 'We know this is a problem, and she shouldn't be in this environment,' " Mills said. "He said, 'I don't have a problem.' But we said, 'Whoa. We know you have a problem.' "

The child now lives with her maternal grandparents, Mills said.

At a meeting outside Selma, Ala., in 2004, family members handed Bevel an affidavit, accusing him of being a pedophile and having sex with Mills. A year later, Mills filed the incest charge in Leesburg because Virginia does not have a statute of limitations for felonies, she said.

Yesterday, Mills said she wasn't surprised by the verdict.

"I thought, you know, once a group of 12 average citizens were presented with that information, that would probably be the result," she said.

Late Thursday afternoon, after the verdict had been read, Bevel -- free on bond -- waited outside the courtroom and shared his philosophies with a dozen friends and family members.

"If you don't forgive, guess what? You're not to be forgiven," he said.

Then the group formed a prayer circle, joining hands with the gray-bearded preacher and speaking of his accomplishments.

"Lord, keep him. He's been a father for so many thousands," said Gwendolyn Webb, a friend of Bevel's from the 1960s. "Lord God . . . he's a foot soldier, and we're ready for the battle. C'mon, baby. We're ready for the war."

Two hours later, after the sentence had been read, Bevel was escorted by deputy sheriffs into a courthouse holding cell.

His public defender has not ruled out an appeal.