Witness reportedly says witchcraft accusation precipitated fatal beating at NY church
A witness says a stunning accusation of witchcraft may have triggered a brutal assault at an upstate New York church in which a 19-year-old man was beaten to death, the New York Times reported Saturday.
The witness heard the pastor at the secretive Word of Life Christian Church in New Hartford tell the congregation Sunday night that someone among them was practicing witchcraft, the paper reported.
Lucas Leonard, 19, who was fatally beaten, said identified himself the one, and that he wanted church elders to die and that he had considered making a voodoo of a church leader, according to the Times.
The paper cited as its source a statement Word of Life deacon Daniel Irwin, 24, gave to the authorities investigating Leonard’s death. The statement has not been made public. Authorities say Leonard and his 17-year-old brother, Christopher, who was seriously injured, were beaten for hours.
Police have charged their parents Bruce Leonard, 65, and Debra Leonard, 59, of Clayville, N.Y., with manslaughter. Four other church members, including the dead teenager’s sister, have been charged with assault. All have pleaded not guilty.
Irwin’s account suggests that Leonard’s open admission of practicing witchcraft may have unsettled church members, the paper reported.
Police chief Michael Inserra said outside court that members told authorities Lucas Leonard and Christopher Leonard, were beaten over Lucas' desire to leave the church.
Irwin is an important prosecution witness. He testified at a Friday at a preliminary hearing that he watched Bruce Leonard strike the two teen brothers with what appeared to be a belt during a counseling session after services.
Irwin testified that he watched through a window and saw Lucas bleeding and rolling on the floor. He described panicked members of the Word of Life Christian Church saying Lucas was dead. He said he helped load the teen's body into a van to send him to the hospital.
At the end of the hearing, a judge found prosecutors have enough evidence to move forward with their case against the parents.
New Hartford Town Court Justice William Virkler ordered Bruce and Deborah Leonard held on bail while evidence is presented to a grand jury.
The attorneys for the parents unsuccessfully asked for the charges to be dismissed, saying prosecutors hadn't submitted sufficient proof to justify a manslaughter charge.
Outside the courtroom, Oneida County District Attorney Scott McNamara said there may be additional charges in the case and more people could be prosecuted beyond the six already arrested.
McNamara said he anticipates prosecutors would ultimately ask a grand jury to consider the current charges "and other charges against these individuals and other individuals."
He also said prosecutors are researching whether a murder charge could apply in the case.
You didn't use logic or reason to get into this opinion, I cannot use logic or reason to get you out of it.
You cannot over estimate the unimportance of nearly everything. John Maxwell
Experience hath shewn, that even under the best forms of government those entrusted with power have, in time, and by slow operations, perverted it into tyranny. Thomas Jefferson
America needs to understand that our troops are not 'disposable'. Each represents a family; Fathers, Mothers, Sons, Daughters, Cousins, Uncles, Aunts... Our Citizens are our most valuable treasure; we waste far too many.
A gunman singled out Christians, telling them they would see God in “one second,” during a rampage at an Oregon college Thursday that left at least nine innocent people dead and several more wounded, survivors and authorities said. “[He started] asking people one by one what their religion was. ‘Are you a Christian?’ he would ask them, and if you’re a Christian, stand up. And they would stand up and he said, ‘Good, because you’re a Christian, you are going to see God in just about one second.’ And then he shot and killed them,” Stacy Boylen, whose daughter was wounded at Umpqua Community College in Roseburg, Ore., told CNN.
A Twitter user named @bodhilooney, who said her grandmother was at the scene of the carnage, tweeted that if victims said they were Christian, “then they were shot in the head. If they said no, or didn’t answer, they were shot in the legs.” Gunman Chris Harper-Mercer’s disdain for religion was evident in an online profile, in which he became a member of a “doesn’t like organized religion” group on an Internet dating site. Kortney Moore, 18, said she saw the teacher of her Writing 115 class get shot in the head at the college’s Snyder Hall before the gunman started asking people to state their religion and opening fire, the city’s News-Review newspaper reported. Harper-Mercer, 26, was killed in a shootout with police outside one of the classrooms, said Douglas County Sheriff John Hanlin. “There was an exchange of gunfire,” he said. “The shooter threat was neutralized.” Although police put the death toll at 10 — including Harper-Mercer — with seven people injured, Oregon Attorney General Ellen Rosenblum had said 13 people died.
Why would we be surprised? Jesus predicted this when he was talking about false prophets:
Originally Posted by Jesus Christ around AD 30 and recorded in Matthew 7:21-23
Not everyone who says to me, "Lord, Lord," will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. Many will say to me on that day, "Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name and in your name drive out demons and in your name perform many miracles?" Then I will tell them plainly, "I never knew you. Away from me, you evildoers!"
When we expect everyone claiming to be Christians to act like Christians, we have expectations that even Jesus didn't have.
Steve.
"I was a deerhunter long before I was a man." ~Gene Wensel's Come November (2000) "A vote is like a rifle; its usefulness depends upon the character of the user." ~Theodore Roosevelt