Category Archives: Scandal

Scandal

Fundamentalist Teacher Accused Of Masturbating In Class

18 Comments

As CBS reports:

Paul LaDuke, 75, has been charged with sexual exploitation of a child. LaDuke has been a math teacher at the school for 26 years.

Investigators determined that, while seated at a podium in class on Friday, LaDuke unzipped and lowered his pants and masturbated while students were present in the classroom.

“Through the course of our investigation, our detectives have come to believe that this has happened several times per year for 10 years or more, possibly,” Nebel said.

Asked if there had been previous complaints that did not result in any action against LaDuke, Nebel said no.

“It’s not that it’s been reported and nothing has been done, it’s just that during the course of the investigation, we’ve come to learn certain information and I can’t go further for the fact that there’s a possibility of more charges before a grand jury,” Nebel said.

You can visit the school website here.

Rape, Scandal

Woman suing church of deceased pastor Matthew Jarrell over alleged rape

29 Comments

Is a fundamentalist church responsible for the actions of the pastors they hire if they have not bothered to perform a background check on him? This is the question being raised by the alleged victim of Matthew Jarrell, the apparent serial rapist who committed suicide while being held in a West Virginia jail.

As Zac Taylor of the West Virginia Gazette-Mail reports

A woman is suing a Texas church, claiming that its leaders should have known that their head pastor had a history of sexual assault before allowing him to travel to West Virginia, where he allegedly raped her in his car before committing suicide in prison days later.

The woman, whom the lawsuit identifies only by her initials, is also suing the Open Door Baptist Church in Mesquite, Texas, for hiring Matthew Jarrell as its head pastor and apparently failing to perform an adequate background check that would have uncovered a history of criminal activity.

…

The lawsuit states that Jarrell inflicted serious emotional and physical damages on the woman as a result of the assault, which could have been prevented had church officials properly screened Jarrell before his employment.

The woman is suing the church for compensatory and punitive damages, as well as attorney fees and court costs.

It will be interesting to see if the courts think this case has merit.

Hyles Anderson, Scandal

Pervert Pastor Greg Neal Escapes Prosecution, Remains on Church Staff

54 Comments

There’s already been some discussion on this in the forums about this story but it’s worth making an official post about it here just for the record. 

As if we needed more evidence that being the son of a fundy preacher is a blank check to commit whatever kind of perversion that your heart desires, along comes the story of Greg Neal who apparently thinks it’s a swell idea to shoot hidden video of women changing their clothes.

News4Jax.com reports it this way:

While investigators said the tape does show Neal handling the camera before and after two women are seen undressing “in an area where they had a reasonable expectation of privacy,” the state’s ability to prosecute a case of video voyeurism expired one year after the offense.

“While the evidence of his crimes of voyeurism in 2001 is overwhelming, unfortunately, the Statute of Limitations has expired,” Assistant State Attorney James Colaw wrote. “Consequently, there is no way to legally pursue a prosecution for these acts.”

Detectives said the VHS tape was discovered in 2002 when church employee Brent Bartlett was viewing a group of tapes of basketball games he said was given to him by Neal. The secretly recorded tape was included with the basketball tapes.

The report said Bartlett took the tape to Neal’s father and the senior pastor of the church, Tom Neal, and he was told “the matter would be dealt with in the appropriate manner.” Investigators were told that both Gregory Neal and Tom Neal denied to the victims and to church members that the videotape existed.

Both Neals refused several attempts to be interviewed by investigators or provide statements. They continue to be co-pastors of the church.

Well, there you go. Do what any good Hyles-Anderson son of a preacher would do: Get your jollies spying on the women in your church , lie to them about what happened, eventually fire the guy who discovered it and then wait for the statute of limitations to expire. Then just keep on pastoring and pretend like it never happened. Simple as that.

Another ministry success story.

Public Life, Scandal

Getting Saved Again

89 Comments

Teenager, are you in a jam? Have you been caught red handed shoplifting or listening to the rap music or indulging in some heavy petting in the school gymnasium? Will people in your church be talking about the scandal of your misdeeds for weeks on end? Is your future career as a preacher boy or pastor’s wife in jeopardy?

There is a simple solution that is 100% guaranteed to get you out of the mess you’re in and even turn it into a net gain: Get Saved Again.

That’s right, boys and girls, take a trip down and old fashioned, red-carpeted aisle to the mourners bench and confess that all these years you’ve just been “playing church” and just today when the pastor preached on how the Democrats are ruining America (as found in Judges chapter’s 6, tapes available in the back after church) you felt the conviction of the Spirit and made a choice of your own free will to get saved. Again. For the eight time. But who’s counting? This time it was real!

Now, if you’re going to commit to this, course of action the details are very important. It helps if you grab an available adult by the arm and drag them down to the altar with you to pray with you. And you’ll need to it on the second verse of the invitation hymn so that it doesn’t seem too premeditated but also doesn’t risk that the invitation might conclude before you go. Note that tears are not optional. Neither is snot. If your church doesn’t supply tissues at the front then pack your own. Finally, be careful not to run the aisle on the same night as some other troubled teen is pulling the same stunt — unless it’s someone who was actually involved in your own scandal.

It’s almost impossible to lose in this scenario. The church gets to write off your past wrongs as the indiscretions of a lost person and avoids the embarrassment of admitting that their own young people are prone to evil. They also get another soul saved for the yearly report. And you get a clean slate as long as you don’t do anything too bad for a month or two. Buying a slightly larger Bible than the one you currently carry is also a nice piece of window dressing.

There are two warnings for this particular strategy. First, you can’t do it more times per year than your church has Bible conference. Second, it really only works until you graduate from Bible college. After that, it stops being cute and it really doesn’t impress the members of the jury at all.

Child Abuse, Scandal

Tim Anderson Writes An Open Letter to Ken Smith

21 Comments

This letter is reposted from the I Support Tina Anderson blog.

Ken,

I’ve been trying to understand why you have taken this so personal. You’ve latched your teeth into Tina and I wish I knew why. You commented on the I Support Tina Anderson blog and yes, I read your comments even though we did not publish them. You said some hurtful things but I won’t take that personal. If you believe that Tina is lying, that is your choice. You may post that wherever someone will let you. I fought for our country so that you might have that freedom. I have contemplated for days if I should or would respond to you. Well, I decided that I would address a few things.

First, please read http://www.scribd.com/doc/44495191/Tina-Anderson-s-Statement-to-the-Concord-Police. This is a copy of what Tina wrote to the police when they called us on my birthday about a year and a half ago and asked her to give a statement of what happened. We stand by what she wrote and what she swore under oath that her statement to the police was truthful.

Second, there were a couple things that the newspapers got wrong. Where it came from, I don’t know but someone said that Ernie was a deacon. You’ll notice in the police report that Tina never called him a deacon and never said that in the couple of interviews that she gave. That issue was quickly addressed and corrected in future articles.

Third, you say Tina lied when she agreed with Elizabeth Vargas on 20/20 that she “lost” her job. You are correct that Tina was not fired from being a teacher. We never said that she had been fired. I understand how you and others could understand it that way. There was no willful intent to deceive. The word lost was used in the context of “no longer in the possession, care, or control of someone or something” (http://www.thefreedictionary.com/lost) but it was not “lost” in the sense that it was taken away.

On purpose, we did not go into the details of why Tina put in her resignation. There were a lot of things that happened that made us realize that we could not continue at this church and school. This is the church that I grew up in since I was five years old. This is the place where I attended the Christian academy from kindergarten to 12th grade. This is the college that I achieved one of my bachelor’s degrees and almost completed my master’s degree (I’d have to complete three more classes). This is where I devoted over 20 years of my life. We chose to walk away. Although it’s been brought out by others, I don’t bring up the names of these organizations because I don’t want to drag them through the mud but it’s part of our life and it’s kind of hard to hide where you’ve spent about half of your life. I have deep feelings for that place. When I say I’ve “lost” friends, it means that us and them have chosen to part ways. It means that people I’ve known all my life and all the people that Tina got to know while she was there, don’t fellowship with us. Will some of those friendships be renewed? I don’t know, maybe. I still hold out hope. There are a couple families that we do see occasionally but six people out of hundreds is not very many.

Fourth, you’re concerned about The Tina Anderson Foundation and where does the money go and how much does Tina and I receive. There might be other concerns but I’ll address the one I know about. Tina and I do not receive any money from the foundation. Now, in the interest of full disclosure, during Christmas time, we were given gas money and our hotel room paid so that we could take a week’s vacation to spend time with friends out of state. The foundation also gave us some Christmas gifts that my kids still enjoy playing with. The purpose of the foundation is stated on the website. If people want to donate to help others, that is great! If people are not comfortable with donating to this foundation, don’t. This was set up to try and make a difference in people’s lives and to give a chance for others to help. I trust and support the people and their families who run the foundation. In fact, I love them like family. All of them have meant so much to me, my wife and my kids.

Finally, Ken. I know this will not answer all your questions and you may dismiss what I have to say. That is fine. I pray that God’s peace come upon you and that you have joy in your life. God has greatly blessed me and I pray that God will also bless you also.

Sincerely,

Tim Anderson

P.S. Darrell, I know a couple of people have asked that you remove Ken Smith from SFL. You do not have to remove him on mine or my wife’s account. Ken says that he’s standing up for what he thinks is right. As long as you are willing to allow him to post, it will not bother me.