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5 members of Jehovah’s Witnesses congregations charged
with child sexual abuse in Pennsylvania
By Maria Sole Campinoti, CNN
Updated 3:33 PM EDT, Sun July 9, 2023
Pennsylvania Attorney General Michelle Henry speaks during a news conference Friday in Philadelphia.
Matt Slocum/AP
CNN
—
Five members of Jehovah’s Witnesses congregations were charged with child sexual abuse by the Pennsylvania’s attorney general on Friday, following a yearslong investigation into allegations of sexual abuse in the religious community.
The children were all also members of Jehovah’s Witnesses congregations, and the alleged abusers gained access to – and the trust of the victims – through the organization, authorities said.
The cases include alleged sexual abuse of 4-year-old child and a developmentally disabled victim.
Pennsylvania Attorney General Michelle Henry announced charges Friday against David Balosa, 62, Errol William Hall, 50, Shaun Sheffer, 45, Terry Booth, 57, and Luis Manuel Ayala-Velasquez, 55, for sexually abusing minors across the state.
A news release from the attorney general’s office describes Balosa as 61, but the attorney general said he was 62 in a news conference and court documents show a birth date that would have him turning 62 this year.
“The details of these crimes are sad and disturbing, facts which are made even more abhorrent because the defendants used their faith communities or their own families to gain access to victims,” Henry said in the news release.
“Our office will never stop working to seek justice for those who have been victimized, and we will continue to investigate and prosecute anyone who harms the most vulnerable in our society,” Henry said.
Sheffer “adamantly denies the allegations and looks forward to the opportunity to set the record straight,” Sheffer’s attorney Benjamin Steinberg told CNN in a written statement Sunday.
CNN is attempting to identify defense attorneys for the other four defendants.
CNN has reached out to the attorney general’s office and public defender’s offices in Philadelphia, Delaware, Butler, Allegheny, and Northampton counties, where each defendant has been charged, respectively.
The five defendants have each been charged and bail has been set, according to the attorney general’s office and criminal court dockets for three of the defendants reviewed by CNN.
The charges are part of an investigation into child abuse in the Jehovah’s Witnesses community launched by the attorney general’s office in 2019, according to a report from the AG’s office listing findings of fact and recommendations of charges against the defendants.
While the five cases are distinct from one another, they share a common thread, according to the attorney general. The defendants and victims were all part of Jehovah’s Witnesses congregations at the time of the alleged abuse.
Four year old
Balosa, from Philadelphia, has been charged with indecent assault, aggravated indecent assault, and corruption of minors, according to a criminal docket filed in Philadelphia County.
He allegedly sexually assaulted a 4-year-old girl whom he had met through the Jehovah’s Witnesses community when he was in his 30s, according to the attorney general’s report. Balosa allegedly assaulted the girl in her family’s basement and told her not to tell anyone what he had done, the document states.
Hall was charged with indecent assault without consent, indecent assault forcible compulsion, and corruption of minors for inappropriately touching a 16-year-old girl whom he met through the community, according to a criminal docket filed in Delaware County.
Sheffer has been charged with rape, aggravated indecent assault, involuntary deviate sexual intercourse, indecent assault, and corruption of minors, according to a criminal docket filed in Butler County.
Disabled sister
He allegedly repeatedly raped his developmentally disabled younger sister, starting when she was 7 years old and he was 18, according to the report. The grand jury heard testimony that the rapes occurred approximately 50 to 75 times and lasted until the girl was 12 years old, according to the attorney general’s report.
Booth was charged with indecent assault and corruption of minors, according to the attorney general. He allegedly engaged in inappropriate sexual conversations with a 16-year-old boy he was mentoring within the Jehovah’s Witnesses congregation.
On at least one occasion, the conduct escalated into inappropriate touching without the victim’s consent, according to the attorney general’s findings of fact and recommendations of charges.
Daughter
Ayala-Velasquez was charged with rape, involuntary deviate sexual intercourse, indecent assault, aggravated indecent assault, endangering the welfare of children, and corruption of minors, the attorney general said. He allegedly sexually assaulted his daughter multiple times, according to the attorney general’s report.
“I have to say that I am thankful to the courageous survivors involved in these cases who were willing to share the horrific abuse that they went through. I am inspired by their strength,” Henry said at a news conference on Friday.
In October, Pennsylvania’s attorney general charged four other members of Jehovah’s Witnesses congregations with child sexual abuse, according to a news release. In those cases, the alleged abusers also found their victims through the church, says the release.
The Jehovah’s Witnesses faith is a non-mainstream Christian denomination. The church was founded in Pennsylvania in the late 19th century and claimed over 110,000 congregations worldwide as of 2022, according to its website.
CNN’s Samantha Beech and Zoe Sottile contributed to this report.
In my humble opinion, some JW congregations appear to be genuinely Christian. I have no idea if they are in the minority or the majority. And, I certainly wouldn't argue with anyone who thought differently. The only thing I know for sure is that these men, if guilty as charged, are not genuine Christians.
California Youth Pastor Accused of Revolting Sex Abuse
Justin Rohrlich, Reporter, Daily Beast
Updated Jul. 10, 2023 4:08PM EDT / Published Jul. 10, 2023 3:55PM EDT
A California church deacon allegedly sexually abused numerous boys on religious mission trips under the guise of inspecting their genitals for “concerning” moles—helping protect the children, he told them, from the ravages of skin cancer.
The abuse dates back to at least 2009, according to a criminal complaint unsealed in Sacramento federal court upon his July 7 arrest and reported first by The Daily Beast.
Reger, who lives in Susanville, has owned and operated several ambulance and lifeflight services in Northern California and Nevada, and has been “heavily involved in various Christian schools, summer camps, youth groups, and church missions,” the filing continues. “He has held positions as a teacher, camp counselor, wrestling coach, church deacon, youth group leader, board member of various school boards, and owner of affiliated non-profit organizations.”
Many of the boys were abused on international “Work and Witness” trips affiliated with the Susanville Church of the Nazarene, according to a July 4 Department of Homeland Security (DHS) investigation report attached to the detention memo. The assaults occurred in, among other countries, Poland, Ukraine, and the Philippines, it says. Prosecutors say others took place in Reger’s Susanville health clinic, on camping trips, and inside vehicles.
Two victims, now adults, told investigators that Reger reappeared years after the alleged abuse, meeting with them shortly before their weddings to advise them “on how to sexually please their wives,” according to prosecutors.
“For one of those victims, shortly before he got married, [Reger] gave him an ‘exam’ as he had in the past,” the detention memo states.
Susanville Church of the Nazarene
Caution: graphic descriptions of child sexual abuse:
Reger was arrested as he returned home from a trip to Colorado, according to court records. When he wasn’t looking for nonexistent moles, he coerced victims into letting him grope them using “concerns about… hypothermia, about chlorine eye irritation, about intestinal problems all as pretenses to conduct ‘exams’ and touch minors’ naked genitals,” the detention memo alleges. Some children were forcibly held down while Reger penetrated them with his fingers, it goes on. Others were told their semen needed to be tested, and were instructed to ejaculate, according to the memo. One victim said Reger chalked his stomach problems up to hydrocele, or a buildup of fluid in the scrotum. Reger then “repeatedly used a device called a doppler ultrasound to stimulate blood flow to that victim’s testicles and penis… approximately once per month and before each trip,” the detention memo states.
Prosecutors say they have evidence of sexual abuse by Reger involving at least a dozen victims from age 12 to 22, and believe there are “likely many more victims that will be confirmed following the defendant’s arrest.” However, another victim wrote in a letter to the judge in Reger’s case that he “personally” knows over 100 children Reger abused, and “dozens of others” that he has never met in person.
“There is not a day and often not even an hour that goes by, where I do not think about the abuse I went through...the humiliation, the fear...the coldness of his soul or the sound of his voice...the feeling of his skin on mine, and the sound of his breath,” yet another victim wrote to the court, pleading for Reger to be held without bail. “It haunts me. He should not be allowed to walk out of this courtroom and terrorize the community. He must be detained for the safety of all. Any other action would [be] inexcusable, and itself evil. Do not let this man walk out of this courtroom.”
An assistant to Church of the Nazarene General
Meme posted by Brad Reger.
Secretary Gary Hartke told The Daily Beast on Monday that all inquiries about Reger’s status with the organization were to be submitted in writing. (Hartke had not yet responded at the time of publication.) The main phone number for the church’s Susanville chapter was out of service on Monday, and a request for comment sent via email went unanswered.
Reger’s court-appointed lawyer, federal defender Mia Crager, said in an email, “The formal indictment charges have not yet been filed against Mr Reger. Once they are, and once the prosecution makes their evidence available for review by the defense, we will begin the process of evaluating the charges. At this time, I do not have any further information about the investigation beyond what has been filed on the public docket.”
Reger’s wife died in 2013, according to public records.
The investigation leading to the complaint against Reger began last fall, when the general counsel for the Church of the Nazarene reported Reger to child protective services in California and the state’s nursing board, the complaint states.
The Church of the Nazarene had opened its own investigation into Rege in June 2022, about four months after being contacted by someone who accused Reger of grooming him as a minor and molesting him from 2016 through 2020. Internal investigators identified between 10 and 15 minors and “several more” adults who had been victimized by Reger during interstate or international trips, the complaint says. However, the investigation only focused on victims within the church.
When the federal and state authorities picked up the baton in November, investigators discovered that the Susanville Police Department had eyed Reger in 2003, 2006, and 2007 based on multiple independent allegations of sexual abuse leveled by a dozen boys, according to the complaint. No criminal charges were ever brought so detectives reinterviewed eight of the 12 accusers, which “revealed a consistent pattern of behavior that Reger used to identify and groom his victims and detailed reoccurring methods that he used to sexually abuse them under the guise of legitimate medical treatment.”
U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of California
In 2008, Reger convinced the parents of a 12-year-old, identified in the complaint as “Minor Victim #3,” that “boys need exposure to outdoor adventure and discussed the camping trips he led in Alaska,” the complaint goes on.
Reger paid for Minor Victim #3 to join him on trips to Reno, Nevada, and Alaska, where he would give the boy a “physical exam” consisting of a purported medical checkup, during which he took a urine test and performed a “genital inspection.” He then checked the boy’s “entire nude body for moles,” instructing him to get an erection so he could better view the mole, the complaint continues.
In late 2009, Reger invited Minor Victim #3 and his family on a medical assistance mission to the Philippines, and financed the entire thing, according to the complaint. While there, Minor Victim #3 came down with a cough that Reger diagnosed as pneumonia. He told the boy’s family the boy should stay with him in his Manila hotel room instead of traveling to a local clinic, the complaint states.
Inside the room, Reger once again subjected the boy to a “physical exam,” including a “mole inspection,” then “gave him a long hug with a prayer,” when it was over, the complaint says.“This ‘exam’ process repeated on every trip and continued at random times in hotel rooms or camper vans whenever Minor Victim #3 saw Reger,” according to the complaint. “Reger continually discussed the dangers of skin cancer. He said the mole on Minor Victim #3’s penis could cause impotence or otherwise affect sexual experience if it got bad. At the end of each exam, Reger noted the mole on his penis was concerning and needed further monitoring.”
The night before Reger was arrested, he was seen attempting to engage a young girl—whom he “did not appear to know”—at the Reno, Nevada airport, the detention memo says. He was also allegedly exchanging messages as recently as June with “someone associated with an orphanage in Kenya, where he had previously traveled.”
Prosecutors believe Reger, who visited 235 countries between 2004 and 2023, according to the DHS investigation report, will flee if allowed to go free pending trial.
“During the search of [Reger’s] commercial property, agents found a file drawer filled with photocopies of passports of young men, many of whom are victims in this case, as well as travel and immigration documents,” it says, adding that agents also discovered, among other things, “a rubber-type mold of testicles that some victims described the defendant using as he taught them to do self-examinations of their genitals.”
An open letter to Reger from one of his alleged victims, which was posted on Medium in 2018, is included in the detention memo.
“You are a disgusting and vile man,” it reads. “Everything about you is abhorrent and makes me sick. When I think of monsters, I see your face. When I have nightmares, you are the boogie man that I cannot ever get away from. Your loathsome face haunts my waking moments. You are the piece of my past that I will never be able to escape; no matter how much liquor I drown myself in in my feeble attempts to erase you. You are human garbage, but unfortunately society will not dispose of you. You continue to be allowed to walk around with [the] rest of us, free to prey on the weak and innocent.”
Reger remains jailed without bond, pending a detention hearing scheduled for Wednesday. If convicted, he faces up to 30 years in prison.
30 years is not long enough. What is that, about 3.6 months for each victim whose life he has trashed?
Was there no one in this church that had any idea this was going on? Was no one listening to God? Is there a real Christian in the entire church?
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