The leader of Mexico-based evangelical megachurch La Luz del Mundo (Light of the World) has pleaded not guilty to sex trafficking charges in a court in New York.
Naasón Joaquín García, 56, is already serving a 16-year-sentence after he admitted in court in California to sexually abusing girls from his congregation.
In a newly unsealed indictment, prosecutors allege that García, his mother, and four of their associates used the church for sex trafficking women and children to the US.
The accused have denied all the charges, which García’s lawyer said was “a rehashing of old, recycled claims that have been made before, scrutinized before, and ultimately debunked and disproven before”.
A fundamentalist Christian organisation, La Luz del Mundo was founded in Mexico in 1926 by García’s grandfather, Eusebio Joaquín González.
Church followers regard García as “the Apostle of Jesus Christ” and many have remained loyal to him even after he pleaded guilty to abusing underage girls in Los Angeles in 2022.
While its headquarters are in Mexico, the church says it has millions of followers around the world.
Independent membership figures are hard to come by, but its influence is strong in parts of California that have large Hispanic populations, which García often visited before his arrest there in 2019.
In the indictment made public by the US Attorney’s Office of the Southern District of New York two weeks ago, prosecutors allege that García and the five other defendants engaged in sex trafficking, child pornography, forced labour, and unlawful financial dealings.
According to US Attorney Jay Clayton, the defendants “exploited the faith of their followers to prey upon them”.
“When they were confronted, they leveraged their religious influence and financial power to intimidate and coerce victims into remaining silent about the abuse they had suffered,” Mr Clayton added.
Prosecutors allege that García followed “a deeply disturbing tradition established by his father (Samuel Joaquín Flores) and his grandfather (Eusebio Joaquín González, known as “Aarón”), who founded the church in Guadalajara, Mexico, in approximately 1926″.
According to the indictment, “each leader manipulated girls and young women by conveying that they could earn a special ‘blessing’ by serving him, which often ultimately included sexual activity”.
La Luz del Mundo published a statement on social media calling the allegations against their leader and the other defendants “unfounded, untrue and slanderous”.
