VALLEJO (KPIX 5) – Earlier this month, KPIX 5 reported about leaders of a Bay Area church embroiled in an alleged illegal real estate scheme. The victims: all parishioners, who said they were brainwashed into investing their life savings.
Since the story aired, we heard from other former members, some who admit they took part in the alleged scheme.
Robert Clark still remembers his first day at General Assembly’s former church in Berkeley 26 years ago. The building now belongs to a different congregation. “It was 1986 and I was 12 years old,” he said.
Clark said as General Assembly grew its leaders Lacy Hawkins and later on Michael Parker became more controlling. “It was a subtle stroking of your conscience until you bend,” said Clark.
Related Coverage:
Ex-Members Recall Lives Under Total Control
Church Leaders Under Investigation For Alleged Scheme
Clark said he was talked into leaving his successful real estate job to use his skills in a new church venture, called Stellar Enterprise, run by Parker. “It was extremely secretive,” he said.
Meetings were held after church services and behind closed doors. Clark says his job was to buy and flip properties.
The money came from hundreds of parishioners, who mortgaged homes and drained retirement accounts on the promise of generous returns and even salvation.
Clark admits at first, he profited. “I began to make money, and lots of money,” he said.
But he believes when Parker realized how much the commissions were, he changed the rules and put Clark on salary. “I went from receiving an average of $20,000 a month in commissions to $1,600 every two weeks, in the form of a paycheck,” he said.
Clark admits he was suspicious but kept quiet. Other employees also grew suspicious.
“The books were only open to a select group,” said Stanley White, also a former church member.
White was hired to pump up business in the congregation. But White said even he could never get details on investment properties, such as the so-called Woodlands of Ascension project in Louisiana. “It was nothing saying ok here is the address you can take a look at it,” he said.
According to White, construction work on the mystery development never started. In an earlier interview with KPIX 5, church elder and stellar CEO Michael Parker said, “Hurricane Katrina happened.”
But the Army Corps of Engineers said part of the Louisiana property was a swamp even before Katrina. Parker said he paid close to $3 million for the property.
Former employees said that failed investment was Stellar’s last. In 2006, the company suddenly shut down, leaving investors with nothing.
“Eventually the gimmick of shuffling real estate and receiving new investments to pay your old investments, the game stops,” said Clark.
He left General Assembly in 2007. “I felt angry, I felt unclean,” he said.
In a twist of fate, Clark has discovered he is a victim as well. He owes close to $1 million in taxes on real estate commissions that he said church leaders pocketed in his name.
“I really feel taken,” he said.
Attorneys for the church leaders confirm they switched Robert Clark from getting real estate commissions to getting a salary, but they claim he was being paid at competitive rates.
Whatever their explanations, state investigators have been looking into their finances: A judge has issued a ruling on the case and we could hear the results any day now.
Sources also told KPIX 5 the state Attorney General is also looking at possible criminal violations, something the AG’s office has neither confirmed nor denied.
(Copyright 2013 by CBS San Francisco. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.)
Article source: http://sanfrancisco.cbslocal.com/2013/03/15/ex-bay-area-church-members-describe-alleged-real-estate-scheme/