The Black Collar Crime Series relies on public news stories and publicly available information for its content. If any incorrect information is found, please contact Bruce Gerencser. Nothing in this post should be construed as an accusation of guilt. Those accused of crimes are innocent until proven guilty.
Daniel Owens, pastor of Life Springs Dream Center in Sanford, North Carolina, and the director of the Dream Center, an affiliate of the church that combats human trafficking, addiction, and homelessness, pleaded guilty in November 2021 to medicare fraud. Owens is expected to be sentenced next week.
Court documents state Pastor Daniel Owens netted more than $10,000 in kickbacks and bribes as part of a Medicare fraud scheme.
Owens is a pastor at Life Springs Dream Center in Sanford. He is also the director of the Dream Center, an affiliate of the church that combats human trafficking, addiction and homelessness.
In November 2021, Owens pleaded guilty to federal Medicare fraud charges.
Owens is set to be sentenced federally on Jan. 23. The maximum penalty for the crime is 10 years in prison.
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Court documents show between January 2020 and April 2020, Owens is accused of conspiring “to offer, pay, solicit and receive illegal heath care kickback payments in exchange for the referral of patients for cancer tests that were submitted to Medicare for reimbursement.”
“We’ve known about that for two years,” Sauls said of Owens. “He’s walked. He’s cooperating with authorities. He’s admitted what he did. He didn’t know he was doing anything wrong.”
Federal documents detail a scheme to recruit people to undergo unnecessary cancer screening tests.
The Life Springs Dream Center posted a Facebook video Thursday acknowledging the organization’s leadership had been aware that pastor Daniel Owens – who has been central in Life Springs Church’s effort to obtain $500,000 in county funding for the center – pleaded guilty to federal Medicare fraud charges in 2021 and will be sentenced later this month.
Owens appeared in the video with lead Pastor Dale Sauls, who did most of the speaking. Sauls said the situation was “not fortunate” and “bad.”
“We found out that on social media, has surfaced some information about my twin brother Pastor Daniel that has been less than flattering to say the least. So we felt like that we needed to give some sort of explanation about that,” Sauls said. “In this particular situation, we knew about this situation before it happened, during it happened, and after it happened.”
Neither Sauls nor Owens responded Wednesday to multiple attempts by phone and email to reach them for comment about Owens’ November 2021 guilty plea in a Philadelphia federal court. Questions posed by email included “if you or the church in general were aware of the guilty plea, why was the information that a leader of your efforts had recently pleaded guilty to federal fraud charges not disclosed at the time of LSAT’s application for funding?” and “do you feel like the taxpayers and commissioners from whom your organization was soliciting money deserved to know that you’ve pleaded guilty to federal fraud charges?”
Those questions were not addressed in the video.
Instead, Sauls explained that Owens was deceived by a previous employer and that it was “too late” to avoid charges by the time he learned he’d broken the law.
Explaining that Owens was working part time with Life Springs because “we were not in a position in those days to pay him full time,” and that he eventually found employment through the website Indeed.com, Sauls said “the job involved helping people get pre-cancer screening. So he began to work for the company, they said you do this and we’ll pay you this. Didn’t make a lot of money but, nevertheless, that was his job. Come to find out later on that the company he was a part of, while he was very well intended, his idea was ‘I’m helping people,’ they were not so well intended. And they were doing things illegal, and when he found out about it, it was too late. He immediately said ‘yes I work for the company, yes I did what they said, and they said ‘okay well if you will cooperate with us during this, then we’re gonna take care.’”
The charging document in the case doesn’t mention what company Owens was working for at the time of his fraud – which prosecutors say involved recruiting people to undergo unnecessary cancer screening tests, sending them to a lab out of state and then receiving a kickback after the testing was billed to Medicare – but it does say that Owens is “the owner of People Loving People, a corporation located in Sanford, North Carolina that purportedly provided marketing and consulting services.” Owens is listed on the North Carolina Secretary of State website as the registered agent for People Loving People.
The November vote to award funding to the Life Springs Dream Center has since come under scrutiny for a variety of reasons – first, its speed (the grant was approved the night it was introduced, even after County Manager Dr. John Crumpton recommended further study), and later because it was determined that LSAT did not have necessary IRS approval as a nonprofit entity. That means the county is unable to enter into a contract on the Dream Center proposal until nonprofit status is approved.
Bruce Gerencser, 68, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 47 years. He and his wife have six grown children and sixteen grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist.
Your comments are welcome and appreciated. All first-time comments are moderated. Please read the commenting rules before commenting.
The Black Collar Crime Series relies on public news stories and publicly available information for its content. If any incorrect information is found, please contact Bruce Gerencser. Nothing in this post should be construed as an accusation of guilt. Those accused of crimes are innocent until proven guilty.
Dustin Spillers, a former youth pastor at Abba’s House in Chattanooga, Tennessee, and president of the PTA at Wolftever Elementary School in Ooltewah, Tennessee, stands accused of child molestation and aggravated sexual battery. Based on scant news reports, the alleged crimes did not take place at the church or school. Spillers was extradited to Georgia to answer the charges against him.
Online records show Hamilton County deputies arrested 34-year-old Dustin Spillers.
Spillers was extradited to Troup County, Georgia, where he faces the charges.
Abba’s House Lead Pastor Dr. Ronnie Phillips, Jr. confirmed Spillers was once associated with the church as a volunteer youth pastor and left the church in 2015.
“Dustin Spillers moved to Chattanooga from Louisiana in 2008 following a former youth pastor, Chris Brooks,” Phillips told WTVC in an email. “He was never on staff nor received any financial compensation from Abba’s House. He left the church in 2015. There were no inappropriate actions by Dustin Spillers known by Abba’s House while he attended here. We are praying for the Spillers family, any alleged victims, and all other churches, individuals, and families that may be affected by the alleged actions.”
Several posts on the Abba’s House Students Facebook page from 2012 share events that list Spillers’ involvement.
Spillers was also the president of the PTA at Wolftever Creek Elementary School.
In a Facebook post on January 2, Principal Gail Huffstutler told parents that Spillers “stepped down from his role on the PTA.”
Hamilton County Schools said Spillers resigned as PTA president during the holiday break.
Sydney Moore, a friend of the Spillers family, told WTVC she met Spillers during his time at Abba’s House and knew him for several years.
This has been a complete shock to us,” Moore said. “He has been living a double life his entire life.”
Bruce Gerencser, 68, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 47 years. He and his wife have six grown children and sixteen grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist.
Your comments are welcome and appreciated. All first-time comments are moderated. Please read the commenting rules before commenting.
The Black Collar Crime Series relies on public news stories and publicly available information for its content. If any incorrect information is found, please contact Bruce Gerencser. Nothing in this post should be construed as an accusation of guilt. Those accused of crimes are innocent until proven guilty.
John Kim, the Korean church youth pastor at Salvation Army Mayfair Community Church in Chicago, Illinois, stands accused of sexually assaulting someone under the age of eighteen.
47-year-old Korean pastor in Chicago has been indicted on three counts of sexual assault against minors, local broadcaster CBS 2 News reported on the 15th.
According to the police, Pastor John Kim, who served at the Salvation Army Mayfair Community Church in Chicago, was indicted on three counts of felony sexual assault on minors under the age of 18.
Based on the video posted by the church, Pastor Kim worked at the church for a long time.
A police official also explained that Pastor Kim does not currently work at the church and that it was an incident that occurred while he was in office in the past. The arrest was reported to have been made on the 11th.
CBS 2 News apparently reached out to the church to hear their position, but did not get a response.
Instead, the Salvation Army confirmed in a statement sent to CBS 2 News that “the Salvation Army is now aware that local police are investigating.” “The allegations of employees who worked in the past directly contradict with our beliefs and values, which also aligns with our efforts to immediately respond, detect, and prevent reports of misconduct.”
According to local Korean media, Pastor Kim has been in charge of youth English-speaking worship for more than 10 years since 2005 at the Mayfair Community Church of the Salvation Army.
Bruce Gerencser, 68, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 47 years. He and his wife have six grown children and sixteen grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist.
Your comments are welcome and appreciated. All first-time comments are moderated. Please read the commenting rules before commenting.
The Black Collar Crime Series relies on public news stories and publicly available information for its content. If any incorrect information is found, please contact Bruce Gerencser. Nothing in this post should be construed as an accusation of guilt. Those accused of crimes are innocent until proven guilty.
Ronnie Hyde, 60, was arrested Tuesday in the 1994 murder of 16-year-old Fred Laster and the FBI began searching his Jacksonville Beach home, as well as a property of his on Jacksonville’s Eastside.
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For more than two decades, Laster was known as “John Doe” to investigators looking into his death. His dismembered body was recovered behind a dumpster on Highway 441 near Interstate 10 on June 5, 1994.
A Duval County judge denied bond on Wednesday for Ronnie Hyde, 60, who has been charged in the death and dismemberment of Nassau County teen Fred Laster.
Twenty-three years after the killing, the suspect in the case faced a judge for the first time.
Hyde was wearing a red jumpsuit which indicates a high risk inmate. He will likely hire an attorney of his own.
Andrew Sturm was at the hearing to support him. He said Hyde is his friend and counselor.
“We recommended him to my mom and my nephew who he sees and he’s done nothing but great in my life,” said Sturm.
Sturm said he met Hyde through Crosswater Community Church.
According to Sturm, Hyde counseled his 13-year-old nephew and while he doesn’t suspect Hyde harmed him, he said he still called the FBI after learning of his arrest.
“Per my nephew’s own words, no one put words in my nephew’s mouth, Ron never did anything at all inappropriate, Ron never touched him at all,” said Sturm.
In court, Hyde tried speaking with the judge but the judge stopped him saying it was not the time to speak about his case.
Sturm said this is not the Hyde he knows.
“Ron is an extremely intelligent person, very much a loner he likes to play his guitar. He would play at county festivals and stuff like that,” said Sturm.
Authorities credited advancements in technology, increased exposure from the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children and the assignment of a fresh detective to the cold case unit with the recent break in the case.
“All it takes is that one spark of information that can lead to an arrest,” Columbia County Sheriff Mark Hunter said.
Local FBI Special Agent in Charge Charles Spencer asked the public for help as the case continues, saying Hyde traveled abroad, was “a named subject in a previous child exploitation case” and had access to numerous children over the years.
Hyde, who lists his employment as a licensed mental health counselor at Crosswater Community Church in Nocatee, previously worked as a youth pastor at Strength for Living Church in Jacksonville where he first met Laster’s family.
Rev. Jack Millwood of Hyde’s current church issued a statement: “We are working and cooperating fully with the FBI in their investigation of Ron Hyde. I am personally not aware of any victims of Ron Hyde that involve anyone associated with Crosswater. If any person or persons has any information regarding potential victims of Ron Hyde, please contact the local FBI office.”
A neighbor watching the flurry of law enforcement activity at Hyde’s Jacksonville Beach home said there was something about the place always made her uneasy as did Hyde.
“It was always a house we skipped when we went trick-or-treating,” the neighbor said.
A similar search took place throughout the day at a second home on Thelma Street in Jacksonville. Spencer said agents will continue an extensive search of the homes, but would not disclose what exactly investigators are looking for.
“The search could take several days and no stone will be left unturned, I can assure you of that,” Spencer said, asking residents for patience during the process.
Hunter said investigators met with Laster’s family in November 2015 to collect his siblings’ DNA samples, building a profile that they could possibly match with the DNA taken from the torso found in 1994. Three months later, lab tests confirmed the remains and Laster’s family members were related.
A match still left the case unsolved. A second DNA profile recovered from a flannel shirt found near the torso in 1994 had no match in a law enforcement database. But last April, investigators sifted through trash cans outside Hyde’s home and retrieved nasal swabs containing DNA that was also matched to the flannel shirt.
“I am extremely proud of the detectives who worked on this extremely difficult case,” Hunter said. “… It has allowed the family to have some closure.”
The sheriff demurred when asked whether there was a sexual nature to the case. Still, court records show Laster’s sister told authorities she and her brother had spent the night at Hyde’s home a year before he went missing and that she woke up to find Hyde nude and trying to quietly wake her brother.
Laster’s siblings said they confronted Hyde numerous times over the years, and each time he seemed to provide a different version of events regarding Laster’s disappearance. In one breath Hyde told the siblings he had dropped Laster off near Pecan Park, in another breath he said it was in the Oceanway area and in another still he said he’d taken Laster to their grandmother’s house in Nassau County.
Eventually, Lasters’ siblings gave up trying to get answers from Hyde. They said they last spoke to him in 2003.
You can read February 28, 2018, Florida Times-Union report about Hyde’s case here.
In April 2022, Hyde was sentenced to life in prison.
A Duval County jury took a little more than three hours to find former Jacksonville Beach youth pastor Ronnie Leon Hyde guilty of killing and dismembering a 16-year-old Yulee boy in 1994.
Following a tearful victim impact statement from Travis Laster, whose brother Fred Laster’s remains were found in Columbia County behind a gas station dumpster, Hyde was sentenced to life in prison.
Hyde, 65, stood motionless as Judge Tatiana Salvador read the sentence just after 3:30 p.m., his attorney Ann Finnell at his side. The verdict came after four days of witness and evidence presentations to the jury, wrapping with Hyde testifying in his own defense.
Standing at a courtroom podium, not looking at Hyde, Travis Laster said his entire family all lost someone who “was loved dearly.” And since no one knew the remains were his until a 2016 DNA test, his grandmother died never knowing what happened to her grandson, his brother said.
He said the teen was upset over a dispute with his sister when he last saw him and he had bailed out of Hyde’s car on U.S. 17 in Nassau County and disappeared.
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Laster’s torso was found on June 5, 1994, behind a Lake City dumpster and missing the head, legs and hands, police said. Evidence was collected but his identification wasn’t unknown for years.
In 2014 the case was advertised on the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children website and prompted Laster’s twin sister to contact staff saying it could be him. More DNA samples were obtained and submitted to the Florida Department of Law Enforcement, which compared results to the evidence found at the 1994 scene.
That led to his identification in 2016 and eventually to Hyde, believed to be the last person to see Laster whom he met in the mid-1980s and formed a relationship with the Laster family, according to the investigation.
On January 4, 2023, Hyde pleaded guilty to three counts of possession of child porn and was designated a sexual offender. Hyde was sentenced to seven years in prison, which will run concurrently with his murder sentence.
Ronnie Hyde, who was convicted last year of killing 16-year-old Fred Laster, pleaded guilty Wednesday in the possession of child pornography case against him, according to Duval County court records.
Court records show Hyde, 66, pleaded guilty to three counts of possession of child porn and was designated a sexual offender.
Hyde, a former youth pastor, was sentenced to seven years in prison, and that sentence will run concurrently with his life sentence for his conviction in the murder of Laster, whose dismembered remains were found in 1994 behind a Columbia County gas station.
Bruce Gerencser, 68, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 47 years. He and his wife have six grown children and sixteen grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist.
Your comments are welcome and appreciated. All first-time comments are moderated. Please read the commenting rules before commenting.
The Black Collar Crime Series relies on public news stories and publicly available information for its content. If any incorrect information is found, please contact Bruce Gerencser. Nothing in this post should be construed as an accusation of guilt. Those accused of crimes are innocent until proven guilty.
James T Beighlie, a retired Catholic priest in Missouri, was sentenced to five years in prison on child pornography charges.
A retired priest has been sentenced to five years in prison after it was discovered he had made slideshow presentations containing thousands of images of child pornography. The 72-year-old’s arsenal of abusive material was discovered after he left nude images of himself on a church printer, officials said.
The U.S. Attorney’s Office of the Eastern District of Missouri said on Tuesday that Vincentian priest James T. Beighlie of St. Louis, Missouri, had 6,000 pictures containing child sexual abuse material on a computer, including child pornography and images of child erotica.
“Beighlie created two PowerPoint presentations with graphic titles that linked to thousands of the images, and often visited and edited the presentations over a period of years,” the office said, adding that he had a second computer with an additional 236 images and 40 videos of similar content.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Colleen Lang said during court that the now-retired priest revised his slideshow presentations more than 200 times.
“This criminal conduct was part of his daily life,” Lang said.
Beighlie had been looking at child sex abuse material since at least 2008, Lang said, but it wasn’t until 2021 that it was found out. In May of that year when he was working as an associate pastor at St. Vincent de Paul Parish in St. Louis as part of the Congregation of the Mission, some of his colleagues found “compromising images” of him on a church printer.
That finding launched an investigation within the church. A private IT support company soon found videos of what appeared to be “minors engaging in sex acts,” the attorney’s office said. During that time, he was removed from his position, according to the Congregation of the Western Province and “placed in a monitored environment.”
The church’s attorney contacted the FBI, which then began its own investigation.
The priest pleaded guilty to two counts of possession of child pornography in October. On Tuesday, he was sentenced to five years and ordered to pay nearly $25,000. A portion of that money, $4,750, will go to one of the victims who was portrayed in the child pornography, the office said, while the remaining $22,000 will go toward other victims of crimes involving children.
In a letter to the presiding judge, one of the victims seen in the child pornography spoke out about the abuse.
“It’s depressing and sickening to know that people were looking at images and videos of my online sexual abuse when I was a little girl and that they were getting pleasure from it – my abuse,” they said.
Prior to serving at St. Vincent de Paul Parish, Beighlie was on the faculty at St. Thomas Aquinas/Mercy High School and Vincent Gray Academy, both in St. Louis, and had also spent time as an associate pastor at Our Lady Queen of Peace parish in House Springs, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch reported.
Bruce Gerencser, 68, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 47 years. He and his wife have six grown children and sixteen grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist.
Your comments are welcome and appreciated. All first-time comments are moderated. Please read the commenting rules before commenting.
The Black Collar Crime Series relies on public news stories and publicly available information for its content. If any incorrect information is found, please contact Bruce Gerencser. Nothing in this post should be construed as an accusation of guilt. Those accused of crimes are innocent until proven guilty.
The Blount County Sheriff’s Office served a warrant on a North Carolina man Monday, Jan. 9, charging him with sexual battery by an authority figure. Joseph Kade Abbott, 26, was arrested in North Carolina after a BCSO investigation into allegations that he committed sexual misconduct with a 14-year-old girl. He was transported to the Blount County Correctional Facility, where he is being held in lieu of a $200,000 bond pending a 9 a.m. Jan. 18 hearing in Blount County General Sessions Court.
A $4.5 million lawsuit has been filed against Abbott, First Apostolic Church, and Apostolic Christian Academy, alleging that the church and school “exhibited an extreme degree of negligence” [when supervising staff and students, which endangered children there.]
A man who was arrested in North Carolina and taken to Blount County after being served with a warrant for sexual battery by an authority figure was sued for a total of $4.5 million, alongside the Maryville church the lawsuit says he worked for.
The lawsuit says Joseph Kade Abbott, 26, worked for the First Apostolic Church of Maryville when he sexually assaulted a minor on multiple occasions. The lawsuit said that the assaults happened in 2022. The Blount County Sheriff’s Office said they started investigating Abbott in June 2022 before arresting him in January 2023.
According to BCSO, he was accused of sexual misconduct with a 14-year-old girl.
The lawsuit claims that the First Apostolic Church of Maryville and the Apostolic Christian Academy “exhibited an extreme degree of negligence” when supervising staff and students, which endangered children there.
It asks the church and Abbott to pay the minor a total of $3 million and asks them to pay the parents a total of $1.5 million. The parents also demanded a jury for the lawsuit.
The lawsuit was filed in August 2022. An attorney for First Apostolic Church released a statement about the lawsuit. It is below.
“Joseph Abbott is no longer employed by Apostolic Christian Academy. We cannot comment on matters involving pending litigation. Our prayers are with everyone involved.”
Bruce Gerencser, 68, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 47 years. He and his wife have six grown children and sixteen grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist.
Your comments are welcome and appreciated. All first-time comments are moderated. Please read the commenting rules before commenting.
The Black Collar Crime Series relies on public news stories and publicly available information for its content. If any incorrect information is found, please contact Bruce Gerencser. Nothing in this post should be construed as an accusation of guilt. Those accused of crimes are innocent until proven guilty.
Rafael Cuevas, pastor of Casa De Oracion Y Adoracion, Inc. in Jacksonville, Florida was arrested in 2021 and charged with two counts of sexual battery and six counts of lewd and lascivious molestation against a victim under 12 years old.
A Jacksonville pastor has been arrested on multiple counts of sexual misconduct.
Rafael Cuevas, 53, was arrested Wednesday and charged with two counts of sexual battery and six counts of lewd and lascivious molestation against a victim under 12 years old.
According to the arrest report, authorities received reports that Cuevas had been molesting a child for four years with the last incident being in June 2020 and the first being in 2017.
Investigators found that the victim was under 12-years-old during the four years of the alleged abuse. The child told detectives that Cuevas would molest her four to five times a week, the arrest report says.
The child also told authorities that the molestation occurred in multiple locations including the church where Cuevas was a pastor and inside of his truck, the arrest report says.
During the investigation, a second child spoke with detectives and reported that Cuevas also molested her on multiple occasions.
Investigators attempted to speak with Cuevas but he declined to be interviewed.
Cuevas is currently being held in jail with no bond.
Yesterday, Cuevas pleaded guilty and was sentenced to twenty years in prison.
Rafael Cuevas will serve 20 years in Florida state prison and have to serve 10 years of probation after his release.
This was part of a negotiated plea deal, meaning the other charges against him will be dropped. He will also be designated as a sexual predator by the state.
According to the arrest report, authorities received reports that Cuevas had been molesting a child for four years with the last incident being in June 2020 and the first being in 2017.
Investigators found that the victim was under 12-years-old during the four years of the alleged abuse. The child told detectives that Cuevas would molest her four to five times a week, the arrest report says.
The child also told authorities that the molestation occurred in multiple locations including the church where Cuevas was a pastor and inside of his truck, the arrest report says.
During the investigation, a second child spoke with detectives and reported that Cuevas also molested her on multiple occasions.
For some unknown reason, none of the reporting news agencies named the church Cuevas pastored. An Internet sleuth by the name of Marshall Yancey tracked down the church’s name:
Shame on news agencies and law enforcement for not making the church’s name known. The public, along with past/present church members, deserves to know that they have a predator in their midst. Based on the church’s state filing, it looks like the church was likely a small church or house church. Just remember, ANYONE can start a church.
Bruce Gerencser, 68, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 47 years. He and his wife have six grown children and sixteen grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist.
Your comments are welcome and appreciated. All first-time comments are moderated. Please read the commenting rules before commenting.
The Black Collar Crime Series relies on public news stories and publicly available information for its content. If any incorrect information is found, please contact Bruce Gerencser. Nothing in this post should be construed as an accusation of guilt. Those accused of crimes are innocent until proven guilty.
Randy Boston, a former teacher at West Chester Christian School in West Chester, Pennsylvania, was recently sentenced to twenty to forty years in prison for sexually molesting a first-grader in 2007-2008. West Chester Christian is a ministry of Bible Baptist Church — an Independent Fundamentalist Baptist (IFB) congregation pastored by Dan Brabson. According to Boston’s LinkedIn page, he was a youth director at Bible Baptist and a junior high teacher at Immanuel Christian School in Hazelton, Pennsylvania for years. I was unable to independently verify these claims.
A former teacher at West Chester Christian School was sentenced by Chester County Judge Patrick Carmody to 20 to 40 years in state prison for sexually assaulting a first-grader in 2007 to 2008.
Randy Boston, 65, of Shickshinny, was convicted by a jury in August of involuntary deviate sexual intercourse with a child, unlawful contact with a minor, corruption of minors, and related charges by a jury in August 2022.
West Chester Christian School is a small, private K-12 religious school.
“Randy Boston used his position of power and trust to abuse this child for his own depraved sexual gratification,” District Attorney Deb Ryan said. “He preyed upon an innocent and defenseless child, and as a result, deprived this victim of a normal childhood.”
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Boston’s lawyer, Evan Kelly of West Chester, argued during the trial that the victim’s testimony was inconsistent.
According to statements made in open court, in June 2021, West Goshen Township Police received information that a 21-year-old victim was sexually abused by the defendant when the victim was in the 1st grade at West Chester Christian School on Paoli Pike. The defendant was a teacher at the school from 1979 to 2008.
Investigators learned that the defendant ordered the victim to follow him to the basement before school one morning after witnessing the victim stick his tongue out at another student. The defendant took the victim to a room, where he shut the door and told him to remove his belt and pull his pants down. The defendant performed oral sex on the victim before telling the victim to perform oral sex on him.
Bruce Gerencser, 68, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 47 years. He and his wife have six grown children and sixteen grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist.
Your comments are welcome and appreciated. All first-time comments are moderated. Please read the commenting rules before commenting.
The Black Collar Crime Series relies on public news stories and publicly available information for its content. If any incorrect information is found, please contact Bruce Gerencser. Nothing in this post should be construed as an accusation of guilt. Those accused of crimes are innocent until proven guilty.
In February 2022, Sean Masopust, a youth pastor for Northridge Church in Owatonna, Minnesota, was accused of sexually abusing a church teenager. Astoundingly, the church “investigated” the accusation before reporting it to the police, sending Masopust to Kansas to “take some time off.” According to the victim’s mom, the church never told her about the incidents between Masopust and her child. Way to go, Northridge! Masopust is married to the daughter of the church’s pastor, Mark Perryman. Need I say more?
The “inappropriate relationship” between Masopust, who was the youth pastor at Northridge Church in Owatonna, and the then-17-year-old girl was reported to police on Dec. 23, 2021, the Owatonna Police Department said.
A member of the church’s regional counsel reported the incident to police after the church did its own investigation, which led to the church firing Masopust, the criminal complaint states.
According to the criminal complaint, a member of the church’s regional counsel told police last December that Masopust had a texting and inappropriate relationship with the 17-year-old girl in 2018.
The regional counsel member told police Masopust admitted to sending pictures of him in his underwear to the victim, and he has since been fired, charges state.
The victim was a member of Masopust’s and his wife’s youth group and she worked at the church’s daycare with Masopust’s mother-in-law, the complaint says.
She told police from about June-October 2018, Masopust sent her inappropriate texts and Instagram messages, including nude photos and video of him masturbating. He also kissed her and touched her inappropriately on a few occasions, including at the church and at Masopust’s home after his wife hired her to babysit their children.
Masopust sent a message to the victim in October 2018 stating they couldn’t talk anymore because his wife had found the text messages, noting the church’s pastor had sent him to Kansas to “take some time off,” the charges said. The victim’s mom told police the church never told her about the incidents between Masopust and her child.
Masopust also texted the victim on her 18th birthday, welcoming her to adulthood and apologizing “for everything that happened.” He asked for her forgiveness, adding he almost lost his wife and family and he’s ashamed of what he did.
“I’m always here and you are a big part of my wife and girls lives so I hope we can remain friends,” the text message said, according to the complaint.
The victim told police said she looked up to Masopust for a long time, noting he was her pastor in elementary school, and it felt weird to tell him no, so she just let it happen, the complaint says.
The victim said she was active in the church until her high school graduation and became active again around November 2020 when she moved back to Owatonna. Around that time, Masopust’s wife asked her to be an adult youth leader.
Masopust’s wife called the victim on Oct. 19, 2021, asking her to come to the church. She said she met with two men from the Minnesota Assemblies of God and shared her story.
The Minnesota Assemblies of God (Northridge Church is part of the Assemblies of God) shared its finding of fact with police on Jan. 24, with the documents noting Masopust had sent pictures to the victim and admitted to a “flirtatious” text message thread, as well as having “hand contact” with her with the intent of having sex with her, the complaint states.
Sean Masopust was fired this past fall, former board member Pat McCauley and other former church members say, and he’s no longer listed on the church website.
Calls to Northridge seeking information about Masopust and his employment status were not returned.
Masopust’s wife, youth pastor Felicia Masopust, was also accused of sexual abuse in a letter sent this month by the parents of a youth group member. In the letter, which was obtained by The Roys Report, the parents state their son received a sexually explicit text from Felicia in 2019.
Kayla Mollenhauer and other former youth group members say Felicia Masopust also failed to take concerns seriously when girls told her certain men in the church made them uncomfortable. They also accuse her of manipulating them and creating a cult-like atmosphere in which they were expected to tell her everything about their private lives.
Former church members including McCauley and his daughter-in-law, Shelley McCauley, say Felicia Masopust resigned from the church in January. However, the church hasn’t made any announcement regarding Felicia Masopust’s employment, and she remains listed on the church’s website.
The Roys Report reached out to Northridge Church for clarification about Felicia Masopust’s employment, but received no response.
The Roys Report also contacted the Minnesota District of the Assemblies of God to ask about Northridge and Sean and Felicia Masopust. Mark Dean, the district superintendent, said “the accusations have been investigated.”
“We have forwarded our findings to the Owatonna Police, as well as to the General Council of the Assemblies of God in Springfield, Mo.,” Dean wrote in an email. “We have no additional comment to make.”
The McCauleys and Amber Will, a former adult leader in the youth group, allege Perryman failed to notify church board members or to investigate fully when he first learned in 2018 that his son-in-law was accused of flirtatiously texting with the teen.
When Sean Masopust left the church staff, the church was told only that Masopust had committed “conduct unbecoming of a pastor,” said Shelley McCauley, another former youth group volunteer.
“The congregation has no idea why Sean was fired, why Felicia resigned,” she added.
Now the McCauleys, Will, and others, including the young woman who says she was assaulted, say they’ve been ostracized by the church.
In October 2022, Masopust pleaded guilty to fourth-degree criminal sexual conduct with a victim between the ages of 16 and 17 who he had a position of authority over. Astoundingly, Masopust was sentenced to 30 days in jail and 10 years probation. He must have received the preacher’s discount.
The former youth pastor of Northridge Church in Owatonna has been sentenced to minimal jail time and a decade of probation after pleading guilty to grooming and molesting a teenager who had been in his youth group.
Sean Patrick Masopust, 33, was sentenced Thursday morning in Steele County District Court to 30 days jail, with credit for two days already served, and 10 years supervised probation, for a felony conviction of fourth-degree criminal sexual conduct with a victim between the ages of 16 and 17 who he had a position of authority over. Masopust pleaded guilty to the charge on Oct. 6.
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Terms of Masopust’s probation include attending and completing a sex offender treatment program, no unsupervised contact with persons under the age of 18 (with the exception of his own biological children in cooperation with Child Protective Services), no access to or use of internet without approval, no possession of any device that allows for internet capabilities or access to the internet without internet monitoring software, and he must register as a predatory offender.
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According to the criminal complaint, on Dec. 23, 2021, a member of the regional counsel of Northridge Church reported to Owatonna police an “inappropriate relationship” that took place between Masopust and a 17-year-old female in 2018. The reporting party allegedly told police the church had first heard the “relationship” was through texting, but after some digging found that “inappropriate things” were occurring. Masopust reportedly admitted to the counsel to some of the conduct and has since been fired from the church. The reporting party said the victim was a part of Masopust’s youth group at the time of the “relationship.”
The victim and her mother met with police on Christmas Eve. The mother told police the church “never told her” about what happened with Masopust and her daughter, according to court documents.
The victim reportedly told police she began working at Sunshine Tree Daycare, located in the church basement, in 2018, while Masopust was the associate youth pastor at the time, and she was a student youth leader under his and his wife’s direction. In June 2018, the victim said the first incident happened when Masopust allegedly sent her a private message and asked what kind of underwear she was wearing.
In August 2018, the victim said Masopust reportedly pulled her from the daycare while she was working and brought her to a back hallway/storage area and began aggressively kissing her and touching her body.
On more than one occasion, the victim said Masopust allegedly sent her photographs and videos of him in his underwear, of his genitals, and of himself masturbating. At one point, Masopust sent her a message complaining about her not sending a nude photo back, and she then complied, according to court records.
The victim said she would be asked to babysit Masopust’s children, and on one occasion, he allegedly brought her to the basement and tried to gain access to her genitals and breasts but stopped when she was clearly uncomfortable.
The victim said the last incident took place in October 2018 at Northridge Church when Masopust tried to grab and hug her in his closed office, according to the report. The victim said everything stopped later that month when Masopust reportedly sent her a message saying his wife “found the messages and got upset.”
The victim said she remained active in the church until she graduated from high school but returned in 2020. According to court records, the victim said she became active in the church again and was eventually asked by Masopust’s wife to become an adult youth leader. The victim said, on Oct. 19, 2021, Masopust’s wife asked her to come to the church, where the victim said two men from the Minnesota Assemblies of God met with her and she provided her story.
According to Owatonna police, the church fired Masopust in October 2021.
On Feb. 3, Tammy Perryman, mother-in-law of Masopust and wife of the church lead pastor, resigned from her position as director of the Sunshine Tree Daycare, which is located in the basement of the church. Lead Pastor Mark Perryman, Masopust’s father-in-law, voluntarily resigned from his position on Feb. 6. Felicia Masopust, the daughter of the Perryman’s and wife of Masopust, also resigned from her position as a youth pastor.
Bruce Gerencser, 68, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 47 years. He and his wife have six grown children and sixteen grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist.
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The Black Collar Crime Series relies on public news stories and publicly available information for its content. If any incorrect information is found, please contact Bruce Gerencser. Nothing in this post should be construed as an accusation of guilt. Those accused of crimes are innocent until proven guilty.
In 2018, Nashimen McKinnon, youth pastor at Antioch Bible Fellowship in Fayetteville, North Carolina, was accused of taking indecent liberties with a child.
The News & Observer reported at the time:
A Cumberland County youth pastor is accused of taking indecent liberties with a child during a sleepover he hosted at his Hope Mills home.
Nashimen McKinnon, 30, of Pleasantburg Drive is charged with three counts of indecent liberties with a child, according to arrest records. McKinnon told deputies he is a youth leader at Antioch Bible Fellowship.
McKinnon called the Cumberland County Sheriff’s Office on Jan. 1 and told a deputy that he “touched a child five to six months ago,” according to a news release from the sheriff’s office. McKinnon said he lay beside a girl on the floor during a sleepover for church youth last July and inappropriately touched her over her clothes.
An investigation following McKinnon’s admission found that he inappropriately touched the same girl on at least two other occasions at church-related events. Deputies said McKinnon also said he sent the girl inappropriate text messages as recently as December.
The sheriff’s office said McKinnon contacted deputies on January 1 and asked for a deputy to come to his home because he had “touched a child five to six months ago at a sleepover.”
Deputies went to McKinnon’s home on Pleasantburg Drive in Hope Mills and completed a report and then took him for an interview at the Law Enforcement Center.
Deputies said McKinnon told them that at the sleepover, he lay next on the floor next to a minor and touched her breasts and buttocks on top of her clothing. McKinnon said he did not know whether the victim was aware of his actions. McKinnon also stated that he sent the victim inappropriate text messages in December 2017.
The sheriff’s office said the investigation revealed at least two other instances, at church-related events, where McKinnon is suspected of inappropriately touching the victim.
Bruce Gerencser, 68, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 47 years. He and his wife have six grown children and sixteen grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist.
Your comments are welcome and appreciated. All first-time comments are moderated. Please read the commenting rules before commenting.
