Master Eric Messes Up

Eric J. Pepin and an accomplice are in the slammer for photographing and molesting an at-that-time 17-year-old employee of his Higher Balance Institute:

A man who is now 20 was 17 and working for Pepin when he allegedly was sexually abused at the Higher Balance office... in Beaverton and at Pepin's former home in the city.

Pepin should have stayed out of the child pornography business and just stuck to selling snake oil:

Pepin's meditation systems, which sell for $79 to $149, help customers develop their "sixth sense" and apply it "inward to awaken a dimensional universe within the mind," the Web site says.

But like many gurus who have fallen before him, Pepin just couldn't keep it in his pants:

The boy, Smith wrote, "was taught by Pepin to believe that the sexual contact was only a spiritual necessity." But after a while, the affidavit says, the boy decided he was being used by Pepin, who bought him meals and paid him $200 after sex.

An all-time classic in the lustful guru's playbook: "I'm doing this for you, kid."

We imagine "Master Eric" is about to receive some karmic "balance" of his own, in the form of a horny 300-lb. meth-chef for a bunkmate, only this time he won't get to be the master anymore.


Talking about Sexual Predators in the Religious Scene:

(complete article here).

A story in the news a few days ago brought an ugly reality to show its face again. It was yet another story of a sexual predator, who walked free from court with just a token sentence. This time it was the story of archbishop Earl Paulk from an Atlanta megachurch:

Archbishop pleads guilty to perjury
ATLANTA (AP) - Court officials say the 80-year-old leader of a suburban Atlanta megachurch pleaded guilty Wednesday to a charge he lied under oath. Cobb County Superior Court Judge Frank Cox said Archbishop Earl Paulk of the Cathedral of the Holy Spirit at Chapel Hill Harvester Church was sentenced to 10 years probation and a $1,000 fine for the felony charge.

Paulk turned himself in to authorities Tuesday night after a warrant was issued for his arrest the previous day. The charges stem from a deposition Paulk gave as part of a civil lawsuit against him, his brother Don and the church by a former church employee who says she was coerced into an affair.

In a 2006 deposition for the lawsuit, the archbishop said under oath that the only woman he had ever had sex with outside of his marriage was former church worker Mona Brewer.

But the results of a court-ordered paternity test revealed in October that Paulk is the biological father of his brother's son, D.E. Paulk, who is now head pastor at the church. As part of Brewer's lawsuit, eight women have given sworn depositions that they were coerced into sexual relationships with Earl Paulk.

Paulk's attorney, Joel Pugh, said he had been working with Cobb County District Attorney Pat Head for weeks on negotiating a deal.

"It was a fair and just resolution of the case for a man who has lived his whole life and done wonderful things but made a mistake," Pugh said. "He's ready to move on."

Pugh had said earlier the warrant came as a surprise to the Paulk family.
The warrant was the result of a months-long probe by Head and the Georgia Bureau of Investigation.

Head called the sentence "certainly adequate" for Paulk, who had never been charged criminally before.

"There are a lot of allegations about things he has done over the past 15 or 20 years," Head said. "In trying to determine what is a fair sentence, I can't look at what he's been alleged to have done in other counties."

Paulk's home and church are in DeKalb County, but the deposition he gave was in an attorney's office in Cobb County.

Cox said the sentence was not unusual for someone like Paulk, who has no prior record and whose health is "frail."

Paulk has been in bad health for the last couple of years after a battle with cancer, limiting his activity with the independent charismatic church he and his brother founded in 1960.

At its peak in the early 1990s, the Cathedral at Chapel Hill claimed about 10,000 members and 24 pastors and was a media powerhouse. The church was able to build a Bible college, two schools, a worldwide TV ministry and a $12 million sanctuary the size of a fortress in Decatur outside Atlanta.

Today membership is down to about 1,500, the church has 18 pastors, most of them volunteers, and the Bible College and TV ministry have shuttered — a downturn blamed largely on complaints about the sexual scandals.

Anne Simpkinson writes in an article named Soul Betrayal - Sexual abuse by spiritual leaders from 1996:

Sometimes what psychologists call a personality disorder compels a person to exploit, manipulate, and hurt those in their spiritual care. While publicly charming, ebullient, devoted, hard-working, and inspiring, this leader proves himself cunning, slick, seductive, and cruel in private. Involved in multiple, simultaneous relationships, he can sweet-talk his victims into compliance -- "Our love is special and holy" -- or bully them into submission.

Sounds very much like the description of the common psychopath.
Robert Hare is the foremost expert today on psychopathy and the author of several books on the subject. He defines psychopathy as follows:

Psychopathy is a personality disorder described by the personality traits and behaviors that form the basis of this book [Snakes in Suit]. Psychopaths are without conscience and incapable of empathy, guilt, or loyalty to anyone but themselves.

These are some of the common traits of psychopathy:

lack of remorse or empathy
shallow emotions
manipulativeness
lying
egocentricity
glibness
low frustration tolerance
episodic relationships
parasitic lifestyle
persistent violation of social norms

Simkinson continues:

United Church of Christ minister Marie Fortune, in her book Is Nothing Sacred?, details the havoc and pain wreaked on individual women and the congregation by the sexual misconduct of one of the church's pastors. Fortune notes that sexual predators go to great lengths to choose women whose current circumstances might make them vulnerable: for instance, the death of a parent, a divorce, problems with children, or an illness. The situation that sends Fortune "over the edge" is one in which a congregant approaches a minister for help in dealing with childhood sexual abuse. Often that confidence is seen by the minister as a "green light" to seduce the person. One clergyman whom Fortune heard about told his victim that the way to heal from childhood sexual abuse was to re-enact the experiences with him. "I am amazed at the creativity that perpetrators have," Fortune says, "the manipulation of theology and scripture and ritual, the moral rationalization they bring to bear: `No, there is nothing wrong with this because God's love for you is flowing through me, and this is a holy kiss.'"

Because of the innocence and vulnerability of the victims, perhaps the most heinous crime perpetrated by sexual predators is the abuse of children. Trust, innocence, and sense of self all shatter, leaving behind shards of fear, shame, distrust, and self-loathing.

The spiritual scene provides a fertile ground for sexual predators to prey, as trust and complete faith is often given to if not demanded by the various religions leaders.