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NYC pastor who ran over, used machete to hack estranged wife
to death, pleads guilty
By Anugrah Kumar,
Christian Post Contributor|
Sunday, November 21, 2021
A New York pastor who ran over his estranged wife with her car and then repeatedly attacked her with a machete in front of neighbors and her grandchildren has pleaded guilty to manslaughter, according to prosecutors.
The pastor, 65-year-old Victor Mateo, who led Christian Congregation The Redemptor, Inc. in the Bronx, pleaded guilty before Bronx Supreme Court Justice Margaret Clancy on Wednesday to one count of first-degree manslaughter for killing his estranged wife, Noelia, 58, who was found unconscious with multiple lacerations to her body on Oct. 3, 2019, the Bronx District Attorney’s Office said in a statement.
“He is due to be sentenced on January 5, 2022, to 23 years in prison and five years’ post-release supervision, with final orders of protection for the victim’s two grandchildren who witnessed the killing,” the statement reads.
According to the investigation, on the morning of Oct. 3, Mateo parked his vehicle near Noelia’s home, and as she left her house to drive her grandchildren to school, he struck her with his vehicle, it said. The victim hid beneath her car, and Mateo got into her vehicle and ran her over with it. He then hacked her with a machete.
A neighbor, Victor DiChristina, 78, said at the time, “I was screaming at him to distract him from beating on her. And then after he took off with the car, I called 911 and I screamed at the operator, asking them, ‘Where the hell is that ambulance? Where’s the police?’”
Another neighbor, Dave Colon, said he ran out onto the street to find Noelia covered in blood. He said she had crawled from the street to a small patch of grass on the curb, while her grandson and granddaughter stood across the street in shock.
“It was a terrible sight,” he said.
Kathy Bellwood, whose husband owned the white van the pastor crashed into during the attack, said at the time that Noelia was crying or praying as she died. “She was suffering because she was crying or praying in Spanish,” she said, noting how the pastor’s wife was bleeding profusely.
Noelia was pronounced dead at Jacobi Medical Center in the Bronx.
At the time of the murder, Christian Congregation The Redemptor, Inc., was described on Facebook as a “close-knit, Spirit-filled, bilingual congregation of worshipers of Jesus Christ located in The Bronx, NY. We welcome everyone to our church.”
One day after Noelia was killed, the church released a statement that is no longer available, saying: “With Great sadness we report the passing into eternal life of our beloved Noelia. We shall miss you sister, and hope that we shall see you again.”
Megachurch pastor coerced girls, women to have sex with him
under threat of ‘eternal damnation': DOJ
By Leonardo Blair,
Christian Post Reporter FacebookTwitter|
Saturday, November 20, 2021
Claiming that sex with him was a “privilege” and “God’s will,” controversial megachurch pastor and founder of the Philippines-based Kingdom of Jesus Christ Church, Apollo Quiboloy, and two of his top administrators have been charged with trafficking young women and girls in the U.S. who were coerced into having sex with him under threats of “eternal damnation.”
“Defendant Quiboloy and other KOJC administrators coerced pastorals into performing ‘night duty’ — that is, sex — with defendant Quiboloy under the threat of physical and verbal abuse and eternal damnation by defendant Quiboloy and other KOJC administrators,” the indictment from the Department of Justice released Thursday alleges. “Defendant Quiboloy and other KOJC administrators told pastorals that performing ‘night duty’ was ‘God’s will’ and a privilege, as well as a necessary demonstration of the pastoral’s commitment to give her body to defendant Quiboloy as ‘The Appointed Son of God.’”
The recent charges expand on allegations made early last year against three Los Angeles-based administrators of the church and names nine defendants, including the 71-year-old Quiboloy, and his two administrators, Teresita Tolibas Dandan, also known as “Tessie,” and “Sis Ting,” 59, of Davao City. The “international administrator” was one of the top overseers of KOJC and the Glendale-based Children’s Joy Foundation in the United States.
The other top administrator, Felina Salinas, also known as “Sis Eng Eng,” 50, of Kapolei, Hawaii, allegedly collected and secured passports and other documents from KOJC workers in Hawaii. She also allegedly directed funds solicited from church members to church officials in the Philippines.
Quiboloy, Dandan and Salinas are charged in count one of a superseding indictment, which alleges the sex trafficking conspiracy. Each of them is charged in at least three of five substantive counts of sex trafficking by force, fraud and coercion.
They are accused of bringing church members to the U.S. with fraudulently obtained visas, then forcing them to solicit donations for the Children’s Joy Foundation which is identified as a “bogus charity” as the donations were used for church operations and supporting the lavish lifestyles of church leaders.
Quiboloy, Dandan and Salinas allegedly recruited girls ranging in age from 12 to 25, to work as personal assistants or “pastorals,” for Quiboloy, the indictment adds. The victims prepared Quiboloy’s meals, cleaned his residences, gave him massages and were required to have sex with him. Five female victims, three of whom were minors when the alleged sex trafficking began, are named in the indictment which alleges the sex trafficking began no later than 2002 and continued until at least 2018.
The victims were allegedly ordered by Quiboloy and his top administrators to have sex with the megachurch pastor on a schedule. They were expected to be obedient and rewarded for good behavior “good food, luxurious hotel rooms, trips to tourist spots, and yearly cash payments that were based on performance.”
Victims who didn’t readily embrace their night duties were told “that they had the devil in them and risked eternal damnation.”
When victims managed to escape from their duties they would suffer threats and harassment.
“Defendant Quiboloy would give sermons, broadcasted to KOJC members around the world, in which he would allege that victims who escaped had engaged in criminal conduct and sexually promiscuous activity, and therefore faced eternal damnation, in order to discourage other victims from leaving, retaliate against and discredit the victims, and conceal the sexual activity between defendant Quiboloy and the victims,” the indictment continues.
Quiboloy, who is a former member of the United Pentecostal Church, founded the Restorationism church in 1985 after he said he received a calling from God. According to Asia Times, God came to his mother in the form of a cloud after he was born, and declared, "That's my son."
"When the Father called me, He isolated me in two mountains. He let me go through some spiritual experiences that I never had before. He said, 'I'll give to you the spirits of these ministries: the mosaic, solomonic and the prophetic ministries.' And in those visions, I (and many others) saw myself standing, as three, big, spirit-like men entered my body. The interpretation was of the three ministries – the mosaic, the solomonic, and the prophetic ministry – entrusted to me by the Father," Quiboloy notes on the church's website where he calls himself the appointed son of God.
Since his calling, Quiboloy has grown wealthy and is a longtime friend of Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte.
He claims to have 4 million tithing followers in the Philippines, 2 million more overseas, and reaches 600 million viewers worldwide through his TV station, Asia Times said.
Matthew 7:15
“Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly they are ravenous wolves.
Saskatoon police charge member of Baha'i faith group
with sexual exploitation
By Nathaniel Dove Global News
Posted November 19, 2021 4:36 pm
Saskatoon police have arrested and charged a 35-year-old man with two counts sexual exploitation while in a position of trust or authority.
In a statement, police said the victim and accused knew each other through their affiliation with a faith-based organization.
A police statement outlined the charges while a spokesperson for the Baha’i Community of Canada confirmed Zehtab-Jadid is a member of the Saskatoon branch of the group.
Saskatoon Baha’i Community of Canada public affairs director Geoff Cameron, in a phone interview, said the Community, a national body, is aware of the charges against Zehtab-Jadid but had no comment on the actual charges. He did tell Global News Zehtab-Jadid volunteered as a youth group facilitator. In an email, Cameron said Zehtab-Jadid’s “volunteer service terminated in February 2016” and that his rights of membership in the group had also been suspended prior to his arrest.
Zehtab-Jadid’s lawyer did not comment.
The police statement says they received a report of historic sexual assault in December 2019 and that one of the complaints involved a woman who was 16 years old at the time of the assault.
Zehtab-Jadid appeared in court on Nov. 17 and again on Nov. 19, via phone from Saskatchewan Provincial Correctional Centre.
Sexual abuse and exploitation, the SPS statement said, occurs when a child has been or is likely to be exposed to a harmful interaction for a sexual purpose by a parent, caretaker or any person in a position of trust or authority over the young person.
The court released Zehtab-Jadid with conditions. His next appearance is scheduled for December.
After sex abuse accusations, Haredi author Chaim Walder
steps away from public life
Celebrated kids’ author says he intends to spend time clearing his name; announcement reportedly came after newspaper where he works told him to take a break or he would be fired
By TOI STAFF
18 November 2021, 12:46 pm
Chaim Walder in 2011. (CC BY-SA Yoninah/Wikimedia Commons)
Well-known ultra-Orthodox children’s author Chaim Walder announced Wednesday that he was taking a break from public life to clear his name, after he was accused of taking sexual advantage of teenage girls.
Walder, known as an educator and therapist in the Haredi community, allegedly used his popularity and status to commit the acts.
His announcement came after the ultra-Orthodox Yated Ne’eman newspaper, where Walder is employed as a writer, warned him that if he didn’t take a leave of absence he would be fired, according to the Haaretz daily.
The Yated Ne’eman management had held a meeting Wednesday evening to discuss his further employment, according to the report.
“He decided to take a break from all his public pursuits in order to devote himself to the struggle to clear his name and devote his time to his family at this time,” a statement on behalf of the author said.
The development came as a number of ultra-Orthodox entities severed their ties with Walder, a resident of Bnei Brak.
Earlier Thursday, Walder was removed from his work at the ultra-Orthodox radio station Radio Kol Chai, according to the Haaretz report.
The Otiyot children’s magazine said it would stop publishing his stories. Walder’s books were also removed from the shelves of the Osher Ad supermarket chain. On Tuesday, Jewish bookstore Eichler’s Judaica of Borough Park said it would stop selling Walder’s works.
The development came several days after Haaretz published an investigation into alleged sexual abuse by Walder, the author of the “Kids Speak” series.
The books, which have been published since the 1990s, tell stories about Orthodox Jewish children and emphasize a child’s perspective on the problems they face in their lives. The books are popular among school-age children in Israel and the US.
In addition to his writing, Walder also works as a therapist and was honored in 2003 with the Israeli prime minister’s “protector of the child” award.
According to an investigation by Haaretz, several women accused Walder of initiating sexual relationships with them when they approached him for counseling.
One girl told Haaretz that the alleged abuse began when she was 13, eventually progressing to weekly sexual encounters in a rented hotel room. Walder told another woman, who was 20 when he began a sexual relationship with her, that their sexual encounters “gave him the power to write to the children of Israel,” according to Haaretz.
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