ALABAMA
KFVS
[with video]
MONTGOMERY, AL (WSFA) – Embattled church pastor Juan McFarland has complied with a judge’s order to turn over keys, bank accounts and a Mercedes Benz to Shiloh Missionary Baptist Church officials prior to a 5 p.m. deadline, according to the church’s board of trustees chairman
Montgomery Circuit Court Judge Charles Price ruled against McFarland earlier in the day, telling him in a preliminary injunction hearing to return the property to the church’s leadership. In addition to returning the property, the judge barred McFarland from the church’s property.
The ousted pastor arrived in the Mercedes around 4 p.m., surrendered it to the church, and drove away in a different Mercedes with an unidentified woman.
The ruling against the pastor came several hours after Judge Price called a morning recess for the courtroom, packed with more than two-thirds of the church’s members. Juan McFarland sat on the very back row and had to be called to the front by the judge to join his co-defendant.
Both McFarland and his co-defendant, Marc Peacock, Sr. were being sued by church members who say they voted McFarland out of the church by an 80-1 margin after he admitted from the pulpit to having sexual relations inside the church building – with congregants – while knowingly having AIDS. McFarland has also admitted to drug abuse and misuse of church finances. Still, the pastor refused to step down.
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