MANILA, Philippines (Updated 5:03 p.m.) — United States prosecutors announced Thursday sex trafficking charges against Apollo Quiboloy, accusing him and two top officials of his church of coercing young girls and women to have sex with him under threats of “eternal damnation.”
Quiboloy, founder of local church Kingdom of Jesus Christ, The Name Above Every Name and adviser to President Rodrigo Duterte, along with Teresita Tolibas Dandan and Felina Salinas are accused of recruiting females aged 12 to 25 to work as personal assistants or “pastorals” for the religious leader.
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Pastorals supposedly prepared Quiboloy’s meals, cleaned his residences, gave him massages and were required to have sex with him in what they called “night duty.”
Five females allegedly fell victim to this, with three of them being minors at the time when the supposed sex trafficking began.
‘Privilege, necessary’
“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 indictment said.
Quiboloy, Dandan and Salinas supposedly told victims who were hesitant to perform night duty “that they had the devil in them and risked eternal damnation.”
Quiboloy allegedly threatened and physically abused victims who tried to leave KOJC or were not available to have sex with him. He also allegedly would physically abuse victims for talking with other men and engaging in other behavior that upset him as he considered this as adultery and a sin.
Those who managed to escape KOJC were supposedly threatened, harassed and were alleged to have engaged in criminal conduct in sermons broadcasted to church members worldwide.
The indictment alleged that the sex trafficking scheme began no later than 2002 and continued to at least 2018, during which victims were forced to have sex with Quiboloy on a schedule he and other church leaders determined.
Victims who were obedient were said to have been rewarded with good food, luxurious hotel rooms, trips to tourist spots and yearly performance-based cash payments, which were supposedly paid for with money solicited by KOJC workers in the US.
In a statement, KOJC's legal counsel called the indictment "another vicious attempt to bring down" Quiboloy.
"With the growing ministry and followers of the Kingdom comes also the growing opposition who are trying their best to destroy it and all the Kingdom leaders,"
KOJC's legal counsel said.
The legal counsel added that they are "confident and ready" to face the accusations lobbed at Quiboloy and other church officials.
Labor trafficking
This new indictment, which includes six other individuals, expands on allegations made last year against three KOJC administrators based in Los Angeles that they oversaw a labor trafficking scheme that forced church members to solicit donations for a bogus children’s charity.
Prosecutors said donations for the charity, Glendale-based Children’s Joy Foundation, were actually used to finance KOJC operations and the “lavish lifestyle” of its leaders.
KOJC members who proved to be successful at soliciting donations were forced into sham marriages with other KOJC members who were already US citizens or obtained fraudulent student visas to continue soliciting in the country year-round.
US authorities have arrested Salinas, Bettina Padilla Roces and Maria de Leon, who are expected to make their initial appearances in the United States District Court in Los Angeles and Honolulu.
In October 2018, Hawaii News Now reported that a former KOJC member accused Quiboloy of running a "child sex ring." Earlier that year, federal agents also found $350,000 worth of cash and gun parts inside his private jet. — Xave Gregorio