HERNANDO, Miss. — DeSoto County’s District Attorney wants a school board member to resign after she wrote a letter in support of a convicted child sex offender.

This comes after Lindsey Whiteside, a former youth minister, pleaded guilty to sexual battery of a child and received house arrest and supervision.

A mix of different reactions in DeSoto County, following the sentencing of Lindsey Whiteside, a former youth minister and basketball coach at Getwell Church.

She pleaded guilty to sexual battery of a child and will not serve any time in prison.

A judge sentenced Whiteside to three years on house arrest and seven years of supervision.

“The sentence that was handed down yesterday is actually an illegal sentence. Sex offenders of this category is considered a violent crime. It’s specifically numerated as a crime that is not eligible for that house arrest program,” said D.A. Matthew Barton.

District Attorney Matthew Barton, who wanted Whiteside to serve the maximum sentence of 30 years, says he plans to ask the judge to reconsider and vacate the sentence.

In the meantime, he’s calling for school board member Michele Henley to resign, after she wrote a letter in support of Whiteside.

“She can either resign because it’s the right thing to do or she’ll face whatever public backlash she gets,” said Barton.

On the stand on Monday, Henley testified that she wrote the letter because her daughter asked her to, but she did not know about the specifics of the case.

“My letter was just basically, it just talked about my experience with the defendant. It did not say one way or another,” said Henley.

D.A. Barton says that nine teachers and a vice principal also wrote letters in support of Whiteside, which is information he wants unsealed and released to the public.

WREG reached out to the DeSoto County School Board and Henley for comment, but we have not heard back.