Have posted articles about this group of vicious grifters in N.Carolina who use Brazilians as slaves
Will post this late one I almost missed altogether, then add earlier information I found originally:
Minister at secretive N Carolina church sentenced for fraud
Mitch Weiss and Holbrook Mohr, Associated Press Updated 6:32 pm CDT, Thursday, April 18, 2019
ASHEVILLE, N.C. (AP) — A minister at a secretive church in North Carolina has been sentenced to 34 months in prison and ordered to pay $466,960 in restitution for his role in an unemployment fraud scheme involving businesses owned by members of the congregation.
. . .
Prosecutors say Covington and his employee, Dianne McKinny, laid off employees at one of Covington's businesses so they could collect unemployment benefits in 2008 when the company was struggling financially. But the employees continued to work at the company, Diverse Corporate Technologies, with the unemployment checks replacing their salaries. They later put the scheme into place at Covington's other business, Integrity Marble & Granite. Covington then implemented a variation of the scheme at Sky Catcher Communications Inc., a company he managed, prosecutors say.
. . .
In February 2017, the AP cited 43 former members who said congregants were regularly punched and choked in an effort to
beat out devils. The AP also revealed how, over the course of two decades, followers were ordered by church leaders to lie to authorities investigating reports of abuse.
AP later outlined how the church created a pipeline of young laborers from its two Brazilian congregations who say they were brought to the U.S. and forced to work for little or no pay at businesses owned by church leaders.
More:
https://www.chron.com/news/crime/article/Minister-at-secretive-N-Carolina-church-sentenced-13778950.php
~ ~ ~
Prosecutor: minors at risk of forced labor at Word of Faith Brazil church
by SARAH DiLORENZO and PETER PRENGAMAN, Associated PressThursday, April 12th 2018
FILE - Jamey Anderson was about 4 years old when his mother joined Word of Faith Fellowship church, moving into a house with other single women. From early childhood, he says he always seemed to be in trouble - and that resulted in regular severe beatings. Now, he's speaking out against the Word of Faith Fellowship. (AP Photo)
FRANCO DA ROCHA, Brazil (AP) — Minors remain at risk and are being forced to work against their will by a Brazilian church with ties to the U.S.-based Word of Faith Fellowship, a senior labor prosecutor said Wednesday after the initial hearing in a civil suit seeking the dissolution of the local church and the school it runs.
The Ministerio Evangelico Comunidade Rhema church in the city of Franco da Rocha has refused to cease practices that authorities have alleged amount to forced labor, said Catarina von Zuben, the national coordinator for prosecutors who work on combatting modern-day slavery in Brazil.
"This action aims to make these practices stop, to make this exploitation stop, particularly of minors, of children," von Zuben told The Associated Press after the closed hearing.
Brazilian authorities opened multiple investigations after the AP reported in July that leaders of Word of Faith Fellowship — based in rural Spindale, North Carolina — created a pipeline of young Brazilian congregants who told of being taken to the U.S. and forced to work for little or no pay.
More:
https://wlos.com/news/local/prosecutor-minors-at-risk-of-forced-labor-at-word-of-faith-brazil-church
What a wildly evil group of people run this hellish nightmare. Simply unbelievable.