The founder of a Philippine church trafficked girls and young women and forced them to have sex with him on pain of “eternal damnation,” the US Department of Justice charged on Thursday.
Money raised for a bogus charity in California was used to recruit victims who would be brought to the US from the Philippines to work in a church called the Kingdom of Jesus Christ, The Name Above Every Name (KOJC), the department said as it indicted the founder.
Some would be put to work raising more money to help fund a lavish lifestyle for Apollo Carreon Quiboloy, an ally of Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte.
Photo: AP
The 71-year-old Quiboloy, referred to by church members as “the Appointed Son of God,” along with two codefendants is charged with sex-trafficking of girls and women aged 12 to 25 to work as personal assistants, or “pastorals,” a wide-ranging indictment said.
“The victims prepared Quiboloy’s meals, cleaned his residences, gave him massages and were required to have sex with Quiboloy in what the pastorals called ‘night duty,’” the department said in a news release.
“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,” it said.
The indictment alleges the sex trafficking scheme ran for at least 16 years to 2018.
Victims who complied were rewarded with “good food, luxurious hotel rooms, trips to tourist spots and yearly cash payments that were based on performance,” paid for with money solicited by KOJC workers in the US, the indictment said.
The indictment builds on a previous indictment to include a total of nine defendants. Three were arrested in the US on Thursday.
Quiboloy, who maintained large residences in Hawaii, Las Vegas, and a swanky suburb of Los Angeles, is thought to be in Davao City, the Philippines, along with two others named in the charge, the department said.
On its Web site, the church claims to have accumulated six million members in 200 countries since it was founded by Quiboloy in 1985.
Duterte appeared in photographs posted on Quiboloy’s official Facebook page in October, captioned: “President Rodrigo Duterte in a private dinner with close friend and spiritual adviser Pastor Apollo C. Quiboloy.”
Philippine Cabinet Secretary Karlo Nograles, who is also Duterte’s acting spokesman, declined to comment on Duterte’s “personal relationship” with Quiboloy.
Nograles said he was not aware if the US had filed an extradition request for Quiboloy, but the Philippines would “cooperate if there is one against whoever.”
A secretary for Quiboloy’s lawyer in the Philippines said there was “an emergency meeting” and her boss, Dinah Tolentino-Fuentes, was not available to comment on the case.
The military is to begin conscripting civilians next year, Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Manet said yesterday, citing rising tensions with Thailand as the reason for activating a long-dormant mandatory enlistment law. The Cambodian parliament in 2006 approved a law that would require all Cambodians aged 18 to 30 to serve in the military for 18 months, although it has never been enforced. Relations with Thailand have been tense since May, when a long-standing territorial dispute boiled over into cross-border clashes, killing one Cambodian soldier. “This episode of confrontation is a lesson for us and is an opportunity for us to review, assess and
The Russian minister of foreign affairs warned the US, South Korea and Japan against forming a security partnership targeting North Korea as he visited the ally country for talks on further solidifying their booming military and other cooperation. Russian Minister of Foreign Affairs Sergei Lavrov spoke on Saturday in Wonsan City, North Korea, where he met North Korean Leader Kim Jong-un and conveyed greetings from Russian President Vladimir Putin. Kim during the meeting reaffirmed his government’s commitment to “unconditionally support and encourage all measures” taken by Russia in its conflict with Ukraine. Pyongyang and Moscow share identical views on “all strategic issues in
‘FALSE NARRATIVE’: China and the Solomon Islands inked a secretive security pact in 2022, which is believed to be a prelude to building a Chinese base, which Beijing denied The Australian government yesterday said it expects China to spy on major military drills it is conducting with the US and other allies. It also renewed a charge — denounced by Beijing as a “false narrative” — that China wants to establish a military base in the South Pacific. The comments by a government minister came as Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese made a six-day visit to China to bolster recently repaired trade ties. More than 30,000 military personnel from 19 nations are set to join in the annual Talisman Sabre exercises from yesterday across Australia and Papua New Guinea. “The Chinese military have
The US Department of Education on Tuesday said it opened a foreign funding investigation into the University of Michigan (UM) while alleging it found “inaccurate and incomplete disclosures” in a review of the university’s foreign reports, after two Chinese scientists linked to the school were separately charged with smuggling biological materials into the US. As part of the investigation, the department asked the university to share, within 30 days, tax records related to foreign funding, a list of foreign gifts, grants and contracts with any foreign source, and other documents, the department said in a statement and in a letter to