Last week, the last of the three criminals confessed to conspiring to defraud churches as part of a scheme they cooked up back in 2013. The news was announced by the United States attorney for the Southern District of New York, which charged the three men in 2019.
Read MoreBill Hwang was hailed as part of a new evangelical donor-class for donating nearly $80 million to dozens of evangelical ministries. But his fortune — which, it turned out, was based on lies, heavy borrowing and risky stock bets — blew up in March 2021, when he was unable to pay creditors. Hwang was arrested April 27, 2022.
Read MoreEmbezzlement will cost churches $170 billion in the year 2050 if current trends continue, according to Center for the Study of Global Christianity co-Director Todd Johnson. But while 1 in 3 churches will be victims of embezzlement, 27% won’t report the crime because members often have a hard time believing they have been victimized.
Read MoreStovall Weems, founding pastor of Celebration Church in Jacksonville, Florida, says he was illegally removed from his position by the church’s governing board earlier this year, after his accusations that a trustee was improperly billing the church for “enormous sums of money” for services were turned back on him.
Read MoreLarry Holley of Grand Blanc, who is the pastor of Abundant Life Ministries in Flint, and Patricia Gray of Flint were indicted by a federal grand jury in April 2018 on several counts of fraud and money laundering. Both pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to commit wire fraud and mail fraud and received prison sentences this month.
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