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LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – The pinnacle of a Mexico-based evangelical megachurch that claims about 5 million followers worldwide pleaded responsible on Friday to felony counts of sexually abusing three youngsters, California state prosecutors introduced on Friday.
The responsible plea was entered in courtroom by Nasson Joaquin Garcia, chief and self-styled apostle of the Guadalajara-based church La Luz del Mundo (Gentle of the World), three days earlier than he was scheduled to go on trial, in response to an announcement from the California lawyer common’s workplace.
Sentencing for Garcia, 53, was scheduled for subsequent Wednesday. He faces as much as 16 years and eight months in jail, prosecutors stated.
His conviction caps an investigation that started in 2018 resulting in Garcia’s arrest the next yr at Los Angeles Worldwide Airport with a co-defendant, Susana Medina Oaxaca, who pleaded responsible on Friday to a cost of assault more likely to trigger nice bodily hurt, the lawyer common’s workplace stated.
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Garcia pleaded responsible to 2 counts of forcible oral copulation involving minors and one rely of a lewd act upon a baby. The costs stem from abuse of three underage victims, prosecutors stated.
A second co-defendant, Alondra Ocampo, additionally arrested in 2019, pleaded responsible in 2020 to 3 felony counts of contact with a minor for functions of committing a sexual offense and one rely of forcible sexual penetration.
Garcia, Oaxaca and Ocampo had confronted 36 felony offenses in all, together with fees of rape, human trafficking and youngster pornography. Nearly all of these counts have been dropped in return for the defendants’ responsible pleas.
A fourth particular person charged within the investigation, Azalea Rangel Melendez, stays at giant, prosecutors stated.
La Luz del Mundo is the biggest evangelical church in Mexico, relationship to the Twenties, with branches in 50 international locations and boasting about 5 million members.
When a Los Angeles decide ordered Garcia to face trial in August 2020, the church issued an announcement defending their chief as wrongly accused, saying the fees towards him stemmed from “unsubstantiated nameless allegations” and “blatant rumour.”
A La Luz del Mundo spokesman reached by Reuters on Friday stated the church would have an announcement on the newest developments later within the day.
(Reporting by Steve Gorman in Los Angeles)
Copyright 2022 Thomson Reuters.
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