Megachurch pastor raped hundreds and forced victims to call him ‘uncle’, lawsuit claims

Naasón Joaquín García is being sued in California by five alleged victims, having been convicted of various child sex abuse charges earlier this year

Naasón Joaquín García, the leader of a Mexico-based evangelical church with a worldwide membership of more than 1 million appeared with his defense attorneys Ken Rosenfeld (left) and Allen Sawyer (off frame) for a bail review hearing in Los Angeles Superior Court on 15 July 2019 (AFP via Getty Images)

Five women are suing an international megachurch and its leader Naasón Joaquín García, a convicted felon, in California state court over decades of alleged child sexual abuse and human trafficking.

The 53-year-old leader of the “Church of the Living God, Pillar and Ground of the Truth; The Light of the World”, or simply La Luz del Mundo, admitted to various child sex crimes earlier this year and was convicted and sentenced to nearly 17 years in prison.

Among many disturbing details, the new lawsuit claimed one of the five plaintiffs said she was “forced to call [García] ‘uncle’ while he was raping, assaulting, and molesting her because it excited him to be sexually abusing his niece, a family member”.

The fresh lawsuit anticipates a class of additional victims numbering in the hundreds, reported Law & Crime.

“Plaintiffs are individuals and residents of the State of California, County of Los Angeles, who were enslaved, trafficked, and sexually abused by the leaders of a global religious institution that has made the economic and sexual exploitation of children and others a centrepiece of its operations for decades,” the lawsuit read.

The five principal plaintiffs are women aged between 20 and 28. They are the same five underage victims originally cited in the criminal complaint filed against García by California authorities.

The lawsuit claims the first woman was 14 years old at the time when she was recruited into a fake “dance” group by the pastor.

“This group would privately ‘dance’ for [García]; however, the private ‘dances’ were, in actuality, the guise under which [García] repeatedly and egregiously sexually abused, assaulted, molested, battered, groped, fondled, penetrated, and/or sodomised Plaintiffs, including Plaintiff 1,” the filing alleged.

The second woman alleges she was a virgin when García raped her. “Once she had massaged his feet for some time, [García] demanded Plaintiff 2 take off her skirt and get on top of him,” the lawsuit alleges.

“While living in his home, Plaintiff 4 was routinely, vaginally raped, sodomised, forced to engage in orgies, molested, abused and forced to provide him with oral and manual sex at his pleasure,” the lawsuit continues.

There has been no comment on the allegations yet from the pastor or his lawyers.

If you have been raped or sexually assaulted, you can contact your nearest Rape Crisis organisation for specialist, independent and confidential support. For more information, visit their website here.