Relatively speaking, and in my personal estimation, this is the BIGGEST story ever to address corruption in the Watchtower Organization, and it is not high on the list of interests by the majority of Ex-JW's--at least, as far as I can tell.
WHY?
Money laundering is huge.
If nothing corrupt were being carried out by the Org there would have been no need at all to create the mechanism of money washing, hand-changing, influence peddling, and phone-tapping.
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Sidebar: Several months ago, quite by random, I met and spoke with a man who turned out to be (and to have been for 40 years) legal counsel for a large contingent of Pentecostal ministers with TV ministries.
My ears perked up! We discussed the books I had written in aid of exposing the Watchtower Organization, and the lawyer's ears perked up too!
He began telling me a mind-boggling tale of corruption.
Long story short, he had spent his entire adult life helping a wide assortment of evangelists escape prosecution for extraordinarily illegal activities which were rampant in their ministries.
He described 'black bag' operations wherein he was handed bags filled with cash and told to hide them until further notice. He described drugs, prostitution, pederasty, and bloodshed he would be called in the middle of the night to clean up and make go away!
He wanted--and had wanted--for a long, long time to turn the tables on these minions by exposing them in a tell-all book. But, he told me with his eyes brimming with tears, he knew nothing would be done by the authorities and his life wouldn't be worth a plugged nickel afterward.
I asked him why authorities wouldn't prosecute. He gave me the sort of smile an old man gives a young boy who is naive. He shook his head side to side and bespoke a tale of intrigue that dumbfounded me and left me reeling. He explained how 'the system' worked. At the top, the connected look out for each other. Politicians need money for election / re-election and turn to donors and money laundering schemes. In return, the politicians provide certain protections for the donors. There are vast networks of officials, bankers, police, clerks, etc. who earn a 'shadow income' supporting such networks.
Well, as it turns out, it has A LOT to do with them!
Religions are tax exempt and their inner workings are cloaked in a special status which hides and shields many opportunities for 'others' to employ them for nefarious purposes.
Large real estate transactions, hedge fund investments, charitable projects in foreign lands, etc. do NOT attract the same attention for a religion as would be the case for a for profit corporation.
The attorney proceeded to tell me how a local preacher, Robert Tilton, had purchased so many satellites for televising his ministry, he had cornered the market which allowed him the opportunity to lease transmission accessibility for TV networks such as NBC (as well as a host of other ministries) which raked in billions of dollars annually! Tilton, of course, was a phony preacher and a scurrilous, addicted low-life who couldn't keep himself out of trouble. He had an enormous cocaine habit as well as gambling problems which frittered away so much cash he was jeopardizing things for his Network of cronies. His ministry had to taken in at leas one million dollars PER DAY just to break even!!
The only requirement his Network of fellow evangelists demanded was the absence of public scandal in order not to jeopardize their gravy train. Tilton could not / would not comply and took a big fall by defaulting on his satellite payments. Even with 30 million viewers and carloads of cash donations pouring in from people needing prayers and healing, Tilton screwed the pooch. His average donor pledged and paid $25,000 per year! (Do the math!) His income was greater than Madonna and Michael Jackson combined, according to Diane Sawyer's expose' of Tilton on national television. A 'visible' income of 80 million dollars per year TAX FREE was easily detected, but--according to my lawyer friend, it wasn't a freckle of the total bonanza beneath the surface which went for payoffs to police, politicians, officials, and lawyers such as himself, as well as a hefty paycheck for mastermind Jim Moore, a well-connected 'media consultant.' Jim Moore would zoom in on who among the donors had big money. They came under his microscope to be scrutinized, surveilled, and targeted as to the number of assets, family members, habits, weaknesses, etc. All of which were compiled into a data base enabling Tilton's ministry to zero in on how to pinpoint his appeals for more cash!
The network Tilton and a host of others shared, had connections with organized crime through a man named Herman Bebe. Ralph W. Nichols and J.C. Joyce.
Ralph W. Nichols (the lawyer who was telling me this) and J.C. Joyce, his partner dealt with the lowest of low-life schemers, con-men, and architects of fraud on a daily basis for decade after decade.
Nichols told me he was now 70 years old and sick at heart. He just couldn't do it any longer.
But, he said he also knew things about the Watchtower Organization as well because some of the people he had to work with were doing consulting work with them. I don't know the details because Mr. Nichols was late for an appointment. It really raised my curiosity, to say the least!
We made plans to speak again. I offered to help him if he would help me. I could be his 'beard' or camouflage in publishing a book exposing the snake pit of crime behind the Pentecostal preachers syndicate. He would provide me with expertise in how things operated and point to what to look for.
Alas, after that one solitary meeting I could never reach him by e-mail or cellphone again.
Make of all of this what you will. It is pointless to speculate further.
