303: Michael Kelsey – Republican Sexual Predators

Michael Kelsey was a Republican representative in the Dutchess County Legislature in New York. In 2014, he was also a Boy Scout leader who took some teenage boys on a camping trip where he molested two of them.

“Every Boy Scout … trusted Mike with our lives,” said one of the young men, according to an official court transcript of the sentencing obtained by the Poughkeepsie Journal. “Not only us, but our parents trusted him to take us on these amazing trips, have fun, make memories and bring us home safely.”

And Kelsey taught him “so many life skills throughout the trips he took us on,” the teen added. “I learned to be more vocal, confident, daring, honorable and brave. I used these skills to tell people what he did to me.

“Throughout the years of knowing Mike, he had taught me the skills required to turn him in,” the young man continued. Kelsey “never lived up to his qualities. He has no honor and is unable to take responsibility.

“I will never be the same no matter how hard I try to make my life normal again,” the teen said. “I will never forget that Michael Kelsey molested me.”
Poughkeepsie Journal
Kelsey victim: ‘I will never be the same’
October 21, 2016

The families sued the Boy Scouts for negligence. For example, Kelsey sang “Hakuna Matata” while naked in the locker room in front of Boy Scouts in 2012, well before he raped anyone. He was sentenced to seven years in prison and ten years of supervision after release. He was released in May, 2022.