Newport Beach Minister Fined in Bribery Case

A Newport Beach minister was fined $7,500 Friday after pleading no contest to a charge that he tried to bribe the family of a teen-age girl to change her testimony against a neurosurgeon accused of sexual molestation.

Fred Kenton Beshore, 63, who is president of two Newport Beach churches, was accused of offering the family $36,000 if the girl would change her testimony that she was molested by Francis J. Williams during pelvic examinations. Williams was a member of Beshore’s congregation.

In an agreement with the Orange County district attorney’s office, Beshore pleaded no contest to the felony charge in exchange for no jail time. If convicted, Beshore would have faced up to 3 years in prison and a $10,000 fine.

“There was a desire to put all these matters behind him,” said John D. Barnett, Beshore’s attorney.

Robert Van Dyke, a deputy district attorney, said his office was amenable to Beshore’s plea because the girl’s family now lives in Kentucky and “said they wanted to be left alone. . . . These people were very cooperative with us, and they had a very strong desire not to revisit this chapter in their lives.”

The girl and a 26-year-old woman claimed to have been molested by Williams in 1985. The girl, who was then 12, made the allegations after she attempted suicide. Williams, 64, was charged with molestation last November, but a Municipal Court judge later decided that there was not enough evidence to prosecute him. The charges were dismissed in February.

In December, prosecutors said Beshore approached the girl’s father and offered him the money. The father refused and reported Beshore to Orange County authorities.