The pastor of a scandal-plagued church in Toronto, Canada, was found not guilty of sexually assaulting a member of his congregation.
Jae-Kap Song had been accused of telling a parishioner that evil spirits would turn her into a hunchback-like creature, before sexually assaulting her.
One of the so-called victims of alleged gang rapes within a Korean “cult” now says the allegations were fictitiously scripted by the “cult leader,” a lawyer for one of the accused charged said Tuesday.
The case unravelled in March after a teenaged girl and three young women told police they were drugged, beaten and gang-raped by a group of men whom they had met through a Korean church between the fall of 2009 and February 2010.
Reports that Greater Toronto Area pastor Jae-Kap (Joe) Song ran a sex cult and received his religious training from a California mail order firm are ridiculous fabrications, Song’s lawyer says.
Nine members of the congregation — including two women — have been charged with sex-related offences since March.
Jacqueline An, a Toronto lawyer representing one of the accused, refuses to call Jae-Kap Song a “pastor” or “reverend,” saying instead that he was the leader of a cult with branches in Canada’s Greater Toronto Area and South Korea.
Song’s legal woes increased this month, when three former members of his congregation — who are facing criminal charges in Canada — successfully pressed authorities in South Korea to lay charges against Song.
The 55-year-old pastor of a Toronto church at the centre of allegations of gang sexual assault was arrested on separate charges Monday.
The pastor’s indictment comes as the church is embroiled in separate alleged sex crimes which police say involve gang rape.