A former Jehovah's Witnesses church elder was convicted of lewdness with a minor for a 1992 incident with an 8-year-old girl at his home.
A Lyon District Court jury returned the verdict in March against Daniel Steven Fitzwater, who faces up to 20 years in prison.
During the trial, Chief Deputy District Attorney John Schlegelmilch said Fitzwater used his position as a church elder to gain the trust of the victim's family before the incident.
The girl, now 13, was left in the care of Fitzwater's wife when her parents went on a deer hunting trip, and the sexual molestation occurred when Mrs. Fitzwater made a trip to town, the prosecutor said.
"He was supposed to be looking over the flock," but he committed a "crime against nature and Jehovah," Schlegelmilch said.
The girl went on to develop behavioral problems, experience nightmares and attempt suicide at the age of 10, he added.
But court-appointed defense attorney Jeffrey Morrison questioned the girl's credibility, saying she has accused others of the same crime.
"It will be your task to determine what is fact and what is fantasy in the mind of a troubled young girl," he told jurors.
Fitzwater took the stand during the trial to deny the charges, but two women supported the prosecution's case by testifying he inappropriately touched them when they were young.
One was his stepdaughter.
Fitzwater lived in Weed Heights, a small community near Yerington, when the crime occurred. He has since moved out of Lyon County.
Yerington is 80 miles southwest of Reno.

A JEHOVAH’S Witness who stabbed another motorist to death in what at first appeared to be a case of road rage was sentenced to 15 years yesterday in Montgomery County Circuit Court for killing one of his wife's lovers.
A jury convicted Alexander Smith Asomani of second-degree murder on May 22, and Judge Michael D. Mason sentenced him to 15 years in prison for the Oct. 27 stabbing death of Oral Duncan Taylor in Nevada, USA.
Asomani testified at trial that Taylor, 31, had called him vulgar names, made obscene gestures and followed in his car on several occasions, including the day of the confrontation in the parking lot of Resurrection Lutheran Church on University Boulevard.
Taylor suffered 11 stab wounds and eight cuts and "any of three stab wounds were potentially fatal," associate pathologist Dr. Daniel Brown of the Chief Medical Examiner's Office in Baltimore testified at trial.
Deputy State's Attorney John J. McCarthy told the jury of seven women and five men Asomani chased Taylor into the church's fenced-in parking lot and executed him.
McDaniel said at sentencing yesterday that Asomani wants to kill himself, but his religious beliefs prohibit him from acting on his desire.

Family mourns death of JW son.

A fourteen year-old boy was dragged under a bus and killed in July as he carried out door-to-door work.
With a Bible in his hand and determination in his heart, 14-year-old Alfonso Carrillo would walk the streets of his west Denver neighborhood, trying to help other youngsters steer clear of trouble.
At school, the boy was a model student, one who excelled in computers and played the clarinet in the school band.
When he wasn't studying or preaching the gospel, Carrillo played soccer and basketball at the neighborhood park.
"He believed firmly that he could help other people by teaching them Bible principles," said the boy's father, Alfonso Carrillo Sr., choking back tears. "He helped a lot of young people.
"We are in disbelief right now."

News sources: Denver Post, Nevada journal and Las Vegas SUN.