ALABAMA
WTVM
[with video]
By Elizabeth White
AUBURN, AL (WTVM) –
A longtime associate pastor at Believers Church in Auburn has been arrested on child sex abuse charges.
His arrest in May got him kicked out of the church where he had been for 30 years. Lee County Sheriff’s detectives say the two adult victims came forward in April to report they were abused in the early 1990’s.
Every Sunday, for nearly 30 years at Believers Church on Moore’s Mill Road, 53-year-old John Sluder, an associate pastor, would play guitar during services.
“People have shed tears because of what he appeared to be, a gentle old man. So yes, we were very shocked,” said attorney Ben Hand.
Hand represents Believers Church where his father is the pastor. Hand says the church was stunned, then angry, when Sluder was arrested by Lee County, after two adult victims revealed Sluder had molested them on several occasions in the early 1990’s when they were 8 and 9 years old.
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