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Man cleared in child rape case

Salem News - 3/7/2023

Mar. 7—GLOUCESTER — A Salem Superior Court jury has cleared a former Gloucester man of child sexual abuse charges, following nearly three days of deliberations.

Alan Woodward, 47, who had also lived in Peabody and Lynn, was charged in 2019 after a girl he'd babysat in 2015 made disclosures to a friend and then to investigators.

The girl told investigators and later testified that Woodward showed her a pornographic movie, exposed himself and then engaged in escalating sexual acts.

Woodward took the stand in his own defense and told jurors that nothing untoward had happened. He said he believed the allegations were being made to hurt her mother and to punish him for re-introducing her to heroin.

Jurors deliberated late Thursday, Friday, and Monday. Then, after one juror tested positive for COVID, an alternate juror joined the jury on Tuesday morning and deliberations began again. The verdict came in late Tuesday afternoon.

He was found not guilty of aggravated child rape, rape of a child with force, two counts of indecent assault and battery on a child, open and gross lewdness and disseminating obscene material to a minor.

Woodward had been free on bail with a GPS bracelet, which was removed after the verdict.

Courts reporter Julie Manganis can be reached at 978-338-2521, by email at jmanganis@salemnews.com or on Twitter at @SNJulieManganis

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