Documentary record Bound by Fear
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Conviction Christian institutions & contexts Evangelical, Pentecostal, and independent Abomey-Calavi, Benin · 2022

Benin: evangelical pastor convicted of serially raping congregants and defrauding them in a land-purchase scheme

Record class

Core record

Evidence status

Convicted

Authority role

Unnamed evangelical pastor, church unspecified in reporting, Abomey-Calavi, Benin

Organization

No organization assigned

Spiritual nexus

The victims were women under the pastor's congregational authority; his position as their spiritual leader is what gave him the access and standing that both the sexual offenses and the parallel financial exploitation traded on, per the court's own combined verdict.

  • Pastoral or clerical authority

Evidence structure

Proceedings

  1. 2022-12-06 · conviction

    Tribunal de première instance de deuxième classe d'Abomey-Calavi, Benin. On 6 December 2022 the Abomey-Calavi court of first instance convicted the pastor of serial rape ('viols en série') of congregants without their consent and of breach of trust (abus de confiance), and sentenced him to 20 years' criminal imprisonment plus a fine of 25 million CFA francs. He had denied all charges. The court found him guilty both of sexual penetration without the victims' informed consent and of taking money from several women for land-parcel purchases he never completed.

Documented coercion mechanisms

  • his standing as pastor over the women who were members of his congregation, used to obtain sexual access described in reporting as non-consensual
  • concurrent exploitation of congregants' trust to collect money for land parcels he never delivered, a financial breach-of-trust running alongside the sexual offenses

Primary record

Sources

national newspaper court reporting court reporting Banouto, 'Abomey-Calavi : un pasteur condamné à 20 ans de prison pour viol et abus de confiance' (in French).

Contemporaneous report of the 6 December 2022 verdict, sentence and fine.

national newspaper court reporting court reporting Benin Web TV, 'Bénin: un pasteur condamné à 20 ans de prison pour viol et abus de confiance' (in French).

Corroborates the court name, verdict, sentence, and the land-parcel fraud detail.

national newspaper court reporting court reporting La Nouvelle Tribune, 'Viol au Bénin: un pasteur condamné à 20 ans de prison' (in French).

Independent corroboration of the verdict and sentence.

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