
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: FRIDAY, March 16, 1990                   TAG: 9003162144
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: B-2   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: 
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Short

EX-PASTOR-OFFICER GETS 5 1/2 YEARS ON DRUG CHARGES

Jerry Wayne Whitaker, a pastor, police officer and former candidate for Floyd County sheriff, was sentenced to 5 1/2 years in prison on federal drug charges Thursday.

Whitaker, a former bodyguard for television evangelist Pat Robertson, pleaded guilty to using a firearm during one drug transaction. He also confessed to conspiring in the distribution of cocaine, marijuana and prescription drugs in Montgomery County from September to November 1988.

Federal authorities have said that the drugs were distributed to Virginia Tech students and other county residents. Many of the drug deals were either struck or consummated in the parking lot of Montgomery Regional Hospital.

Whitaker - who was pastor of the Willis Baptist Church in Floyd County for about two years - had also been a Montgomery County sheriff's deputy and Christiansburg police officer.

He unsuccessfully ran for sheriff of Floyd County in 1987.

by CNB