Alamo's Last Stand: Controversial Preacher's Ministry Raided by Feds

Sept. 23, 2008 — -- Tony Alamo is laughing.

Sure, his Christian ministry's compound in Arkansas was raided over the weekend by more than 100 federal agents as part of a two-year investigation into allegations of child pornography, physical and sexual abuse of children, polygamy and underage marriage.

And he's been accused by ex-followers of beating children who misbehave and separating husbands from their wives and children to punish them for various infractions.

But Alamo (pronounced ah-LAM-o) seems relaxed when discussing the accusations and the raid with ABCNews.com, relishing the fact that the raid took place on his 74th birthday last weekend. And he remains defiant in his denial of the allegations and unrepentant about his promotion of marriage between older men and girls as young as 10.

"The government -- those devils -- they gave me this as a birthday present," says Alamo. "These attacks on me and the ministry have been going on for 44 years. It's nothing new. Nothing shaking but the leaves on the tree.

"They think they're hurting me but I'm feeling pretty good. The Bible says that when they persecute you to leap for joy because the prophets were dealt with in the same manner."

Alamo, who says that he has not been contacted by federal officials, denies some of the allegations and sidesteps straight answers on some other claims.

Asked if minors were abused, sexually or physically at the compound, Alamo sarcastically snaps, "Oh, yeah. We're just open to have minors abused. We're a church and we're not phonies, and that's why they're so obsessed with us."

Alamo denies that there was any child pornography at the compound.

"They ransacked our church, my bedroom, and they haven't even found one porn picture. Why would I be into that? I'm legally blind, and I wouldn't have been able to look at it."

As for his controversial positions on underage marriage, which he has long promoted on his radio shows, Alamo defended his views.

"The Bible says the age of puberty is the age of consent," he says, emphasizing that he supports the idea of marriage to post-pubescent girls but that members of his church don't act on that view and follow the law. "We don't have anyone married to children under the 18-year-old limit, but the Bible says that's OK if they're age 10 or 12, if they reached puberty."

Dark Side to All-American Story

It's the all-American story with a dark and dangerous twist.

A Jewish newspaper delivery boy from Montana moves to Hollywood in the heyday of the swinging '60s and changes his name to Tony Alamo to pursue a career in music.

Later, he converts to evangelical Christianity and becomes a preacherwho ministers to the homeless and drug addicts, raising money for hischurch by selling a popular brand of sequined denim jackets worn bycelebrities such as Brooke Shields, Mr. T and Hulk Hogan during the 1980s.

But Alamo's shadow side ended up dominating headlines.

The man once described by ex-Gov. of Arkansas and former President Bill Clinton as "Roy Orbison on speed" was accused of leading a cult, landed in prison for tax evasion and weapons violations, spouted anti-Catholic propaganda on the air and in pamphlets, and attacked the pope and President Reagan by calling them "Anti-Christ Devils" in a tract titled "Genocide".

After his wife, Susan, died in 1982, he placed her body in a crystalcrypt on his dining room table while his followers prayed for herresurrection; later, he was accused of spiriting the body away beforehis religious compound was raided by federal marshals in 1991, and herbody remained missing until church members turned it over to lawenforcement in 1998.

In the latest incident, the headquarters of his Tony Alamo Christian Ministries Church in the tiny town of Fouke, Ark., was raided over the weekend by more than 100 federal and state officials, and six children were removed from the compound while investigators searched for their parents, according to Arkansas State Police.

The two-year investigation was "aimed at allegations that childrenliving at the Alamo facilities may have been sexually and physicallyabused," according to Bill Sadler, spokesman for the Arkansas StatePolice.

"We did make the decision to remove the children that we felt were in harm's way or in imminent danger," said Julie Munsell, spokeswoman for the Arkansas Department of Human Services.

Ex-Followers' Bad Memories

Media coverage of the raid brought back terrible memories for Jared Balsley, a radio DJ, who claims he was regularly beaten by Alamo's aides and once when he was only 8 years old by Alamo himself after arguing with another boy over a Big Wheel.

"We were not spanked at Tony Alamo's house on Georgia Ridge. ... We were beaten," says Balsley.

"Beaten for infractions of his rules. Tony would order four of his biggest guys to hold me up spread-eagled, and then they would hit you with a board that was nicknamed the 'Board of Education.'"

Balsley continued, "There was a girl who had epilepsy and I remember her having a seizure one time, and Tony brought in dozens of families, saying, 'Well, the devil is in this girl,' and he had her hit, strung her up in the air, and said they would beat the devil out of her ... He's a horrible, horrible person. He makes Warren Jeffs look like an angel in my opinion."

Alamo defends his treatment of his followers but admits, "Some of them got spankings and I tossed some of them out because they were doing things that were against Scripture. They're miffed and disgruntled, and some of them bring accusations of child abuse."

Asked about claims that children were kept out of school to work on his line of designer jeans, Alamo makes light of the charge.

"I had adults working on that, and kids would come in and count beads -- like that's real hard labor."

Defending Polygamy

Alamo, who strongly defended the polygamy practiced by the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints Mormon sect after its Texas compound was raided in April, has long advocated that such unions between older men and teenage girls are God's will.

"What I'm doing is fighting for these people that they, the ungodlybeast, is throwing into prison for marrying someone 16, 15, 14, 13,12, 11, 10, if they've reached puberty," he told his radio listenersin an April broadcast.

In other radio sermons, Alamo contended that the Virgin Mary was only6 when she conceived Jesus, asking his listeners whether that madeGod a pedophile.

Spokesmen for the FBI and the Arkansas State Police would not discusswhether an arrest warrant is pending for Alamo or whether he has beeninterviewed as part of their investigation.

"He has been around for a long time and he is really creepy," says Heidi Beirich, deputy director of the Southern Poverty Law Center's Intelligence Project. "We interviewed some of the ministry's child brides, documented some of the virulent hatred directed at Catholics and have documented many complaints about the ministry and forwarded the info to the FBI."

From Hollywood to High Fashion to Holy Days

It's been a long journey for Bernie LaZar Hoffman, the son of Jewish-Romanian parents, who worked delivering newspapers in Montana as a boy.

Soon after heading out to Los Angeles, he changed his name severaltimes while chasing a career in pop music, singing and producingalbums, and claimed that the Beatles and Rolling Stones sought hisservices as a promoter.

But his life changed during a business meeting in 1964 when he claimedthat God temporarily struck him deaf and gave him an ultimatum: Telleveryone that Jesus is coming back to Earth, or die, according to aSPLC report on Alamo and his ministry.

Soon after meeting Susan Lipowitz, a Jewish convert to evangelicalChristianity, he changed his name to Tony Alamo. The couple set uptheir Christian foundation in 1969, distributing paranoid screedsabout the end of the world to drug-addled hippies on HollywoodBoulevard.

His followers lived in sex-segregated dormitories and suffered a range of punishments --from beatings to losing their spouses and children -- if they broke Alamo's rules, according to several ex-followers.

"We were in fear of him," says a former devotee who joined theministry in the '70s and left in 1996. "I joined because I wasidealistic and wanted to make the world a better place, telling peoplethat we have the truth."

Former followers say that Alamo used to preach fundamentalist sermons about the return of Jesus, urging his followers not to use birth control and railing against the Vatican.

"I'm embarrassed now to think about it, but he somehow convinced usthat he was a prophet of God and we had to obey him," said a former sect member.

The ex-devotee says that followers were urged to work long hours and then turn all their money over to the ministry, including children who were kept out of school and forced to help sew rhinestones into the famed Alamo jackets.

While Alamo had a charismatic presence and attracted Clinton, DollyParton, Ronnie Milsap and other country stars to his restaurant inAlma, Ark., his followers saw a different side to the man.

"For us, he was a cruel taskmaster," the former member explained. "He could kick you out in a heartbeat. We didn't own anything, and he could take your house away. That's how powerful he was."

Despite legal problems ranging from tax troubles to labor-law violations, Alamo expanded his empire, setting up several churches and owning 30 businesses -- from a hog farm and supermarket to a restaurant and banquet room -- in Alma, where Clinton remembers seeing Dolly Parton perform, according to his autobiography, "My Life."

Secretive Ministry Raided

When Susan Alamo died of cancer in 1982, he became convinced that she was an immortal prophet who would rise from the dead as a witness of the Book of Revelation. Rather than bury her body, Alamo embalmed itand set it up in a crystal casket on his dining room table, commanding his followers to pray in two-hour shifts around the clock.

Since his release from prison in 1998, Alamo relocated his main ministryto Fouke, a town with 800 residents, where his armed security guardshave butted heads with local law enforcement.

"They've always had armed guards stopping people on a public road andtelling them they could not come up on the property," says Mayor TerryPurvis.

"It's a secretive culture -- they've got some trailer homes and a fewduplexes up there where their members stay and live," he said. "I've had several ex-followers call me up with allegations about polygamy and underage marriage."

Purvis, who witnessed the raid, was thankful that it went smoothly andthat federal agents did not encounter resistance.

"They didn't tell me much, just that they were serving a search warrant that pertained to child pornography and child abuse," he says. "I'm just glad that there was no resistance. My biggest fear was a Waco situation."