Gospel for Asia donors misled, couple's suit says

A $345 donation to Gospel for Asia will buy a camel for a poor family in India.

A $1,400 gift will pay for a "Jesus well" to make sure a village has clean drinking water.

But millions of dollars given to the Christian missionary organization never made it to the intended recipients, according to a lawsuit filed this week in federal court in Fayetteville.

Instead, the money went toward other things, including for-profit businesses, construction of personal residences and sponsorship of a soccer team playing in the Myanmar National League, according to the lawsuit.

A Rogers couple filed suit against the Texas-based charity, alleging fraud, racketeering, violation of the Arkansas Deceptive Trade Practices Act and "unjust enrichment."

The plaintiffs are Matthew and Jennifer Dickson, who donated $1,753 to Gospel for Asia in 2013, including a $25 donation to its "Widows and Abandoned Children" fund as a Mother's Day present for Matthew Dickson's mother. At the time, Gospel for Asia claimed 100 percent of donations went toward donor-specified purposes.

Defendants are Gospel for Asia, its founder K.P. Yohannan, his wife, his son and two others in the organization.

Yohannan was born and raised in Niranam, Kerala, in southwest India. He is also "metropolitan bishop" of Believers Church, which he founded in 2003, according to the lawsuit. The evangelical Christian church has seven dioceses in India and one in Nepal.

Yohannan used the charitable donations to enrich his own "personal empire," according to the lawsuit.

"Soliciting charitable donations to benefit the poorest of the poor while covertly diverting the money to a multi-million dollar personal empire is reprehensible," the court filing said. "Using a Christian organization as a front to attract and exploit the goodwill and generosity of devout Christians is a particularly vile scheme. But that is exactly what K.P. Yohannan and the organization he controls -- Gospel for Asia Inc. -- have been getting away with for years."

Yohannan and his close associates have acquired hundreds of millions of dollars from tens of thousands of well-intentioned donors, according to the lawsuit. Gospel for Asia used some of that money to buy and run for-profit businesses, build an expensive headquarters in Texas and and speculate in financial markets, according to the court filing.

Gospel for Asia is based in Wills Point, Texas, 50 miles east of Dallas. The Internal Revenue Service recognizes Gospel for Asia as a nonprofit organization and a "religious order," according to the court document.

The lawsuit was filed by attorneys with the Bassett Law Firm of Fayetteville and two Dallas firms, Stanley Law Group and Mills and Williams LLP.

Martin Woodward, a lawyer with the Stanley Law Group, said the Dicksons are typical of most donors to Gospel for Asia. They want the gifts to go for certain things, and Gospel for Asia offers a "Christmas catalog" to encourage giving specific items.

"The bulk of what Gospel of Asia gets comes from donors just like the Dicksons, who see on their website that they can donate $345 for a camel or $12 for a blanket, whatever it is," Woodward said. "What we've seen thus far is pretty compelling evidence that very little of that is actually being used in the field in India in the way that Gospel for Asia promises that it will be used."

Taun Cortado, a spokesman for Gospel for Asia, didn't return a telephone call or email message sent to him on Wednesday.

According to the lawsuit, Gospel for Asia collected about $115 million worldwide in 2013, but only $14.6 million of that amount went to help the poor of India, "contrary to donor designations."

Another $37.8 million was spent on "administrative needs" of the various national offices in the United States, Canada, United Kingdom, Australia, New Zealand and Germany, according to the suit, and almost $43 million "went missing." The figures are based on financial information that Gospel for Asia was required by law to report to the government of India, according to the suit, which was filed Monday.

The Evangelical Council for Financial Accountability "decertified" Gospel for Asia in September "after investigating its finances," according to the lawsuit.

Before that happened in September, Gospel for Asia solicited donations while promising to use 100 percent of it for donor-specified purposes in the mission field. "Nothing is taken out for administrative expenses," Yohannan wrote last year on the organization's website, gfa.org:. "Our administrative costs are covered through donations designated 'Home Office' or sometimes 'where most needed,'" according to another website post.

But since September, the organization has added a sentence to its website: "We are committed to honoring your gift preferences, however, occasionally we receive more contributions for a given project than can be wisely applied to that project. When this happens we use the funds to meet a similar pressing need."

Gospel for Asia raised $450 million from U.S. donors alone from 2007 through 2013, according to the suit. The "amount in controversy" exceeds the $5 million threshold to be a class-action case, according to the court filing.

Concerning the Jesus wells, in 2012, Gospel for Asia collected $3.5 million for that purpose but only spent $500,000 on the wells, according to the lawsuit. The next year, the organization collected $4 million for wells and spent $700,000 on them, according to the court document.

In 2014, Gospel for Asia had a fundraising drive called "Arkansas to Asia With Love," which raised $1,020 through yard sales and other efforts to pay for a "Jesus well."

One of the donors was the Berean Coffeehouse in Eureka Springs, which is affiliated with Calvary Chapel.

A person at the coffeehouse, who didn't want his name used in this article, said the Berean Coffeehouse had given Gospel for Asia $4,000 for Jesus wells in addition to other donations. Rumors began circulating last year that Gospel for Asia wasn't using donations as specified by donors, and the Eureka Springs church/coffee shop pulled its support in January.

"We wanted to wait and see, but what we waited and saw wasn't good," said the person at Berean. "I really believe that K.P. has done a lot of great work. I don't know what has happened to them. I think it's the Lord who's kind of sidelined them. We pray that they get themselves back on the right track."

Metro on 02/11/2016

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