Sunshine Coast Jehovah’s Witness figure’s alleged rape details emerge
More details have emerged of a Sunshine Coast Jehovah’s Witness figure’s alleged rapes including targeting his own grand-nephew and others from bible study. Warning: Graphic.
Police & Courts
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Details of a Jehovah’s Witness figure’s alleged rapes against young men have emerged with police claiming the assaults were done under the guise of “positive affirmations”.
Sunshine Coast detectives arrested the man over the weekend on 54 sex charges including 21 counts of rape, 17 of sexual assault, 13 of procuring sexual act by false pretence, torture, common assault and incest.
Police allege the Sunshine Coast man used his position of religious standing within the Jehovah’s Witness community to target young men between 2008 and 2018.
The alleged offences related to four men aged in their late teens to early 20s, with one being a biological grand-nephew while others were met through bible study.
More details of the alleged incidents committed by the Jehovah’s Witness figure can now be revealed in exclusive court documents in objection to the man’s bail.
Detectives in court documents labelled the alleged assaults as “appalling and degrading” and detailed the incidents from the four complainants from 2008-2018.
Police allege in court documents the Jehovah’s Witness figure was the great-uncle of one of the complainants and over several years raped and sexually assaulted his grand-nephew while doing “positive affirmations” to enhance energy and break down egos.
Court documents say the affirmations consisted of standing in a room or in front of a mirror repeating the phrase “I’m strong, I’m powerful, I’m confident … I’m beautiful, I’m sexy”.
Through these affirmations, police allege the man escalated his offending, working up to the alleged rapes.
Police allege during the alleged rapes called “energy exercises” at his office on the Sunshine Coast, they would be filmed with an iPad.
Detectives say the man told the alleged victim to do his affirmations during the alleged rape and later watched the video together so the victim could “lose his embarrassment”.
On other alleged occasions the man would make the complainant perform oral sex to be “in-synced (sic)” so he could check energy levels.
The victim said in court documents the alleged assaults were always because the alleged victim’s “energy levels (were) down”.
A pretext conversation between the man and the alleged victim monitored by investigators in late-August, 2022 led to the Jehovah’s Witness figure saying it was “about making the victim strong” and recalled certain events, the videos and the risks if his family found out about it all.
He was arrested on August 28, 2022 after this interview.
Other alleged victims said they met the man through bible studies, where they were also allegedly made to do naked affirmations.
One of the alleged victims said it “wouldn’t matter” if the man’s wife or children were home.
Police say in court documents three of the alleged victims went to police independent of each other, with two of them trying to report the matters to the Jehovah’s Witness Religious Elders.
“The victims were chasisted, not believed and ostracised,” police say in court documents.
The Jehovah’s Witness figure applied for bail in Maroochydore Magistrates Court on Monday August 29, 2022 but had it adjourned to Wednesday August 31, 2022.
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