Don't Feed the Preacher

In May, for instance, a man at 87th Street and Lackman Road in Lenexa approached the car of Julie Diekemper, a therapist at Safehome, a battered-women's shelter in Johnson County. The man said he was collecting for a domestic-violence agency. Diekemper asked for the name of the organization. The man waved at a church down the street.

Diekemper then explained where she worked. Suddenly, the conversation ended. "He walked away from my car and didn't want to talk to me anymore," Diekemper tells the Pitch.

Another fund-raising group spotted in Kansas City represents a Florida ministry with the distinction of the church itself having been convicted of a felony.

On a recent Saturday, two men wearing ties and pinstriped ball caps worked a hectic intersection in Kansas City, North. Armed with white buckets, they sidled up to the queue of cars waiting to turn onto Barry Road from Boardwalk Avenue and Roanridge Road.

The men identified their cause as "International Life Ministries." The leader of the duo, who went by the name Taylor, said the ministry helped the homeless, battered women and children.

Drivers who put the money in the buckets weren't helping Kansas City's vulnerable. Taylor said the ministry was just passing though town. "My church is in Las Vegas," he said.

Asked for a source for more information about the ministry, Taylor gave a phone number. The number is answered by Deeper Life Christian Church in Indianapolis.

Headquartered in Tampa, Florida, Deeper Life has been accused of using cultlike practices to keep its members raising money on the streets. In 1997, the church and its leaders were charged with state food-stamp fraud. Charges against the church founder, Melvin Jefferson, and his wife, Brenda, were dropped in exchange for a guilty plea from the church itself, according to The Tampa Tribune. The newspaper also found that while church members walked the streets for donations, the Jeffersons drove a Bentley and lived in a $581,000 house.

At Deeper Life in Tampa, Gail Green, who describes herself as an "administrator," says churches in Kansas City are affiliated with the ministry, but she is unable to name any of them. The main work, she explains, goes on in Tampa. "You would have to take a visit here to see what we do," she says.

But for dauntlessness, few ministries match Carva White's.

A tractor-trailer is parked outside Mike Hardy's house on Kansas City's east side. Hardy drives an 18-wheeler 2,300 miles a week. On Sundays, he preaches.

Hardy's church meets at Fourth Street and Indiana. Five years ago, he worked with Carva White at New Higher Ground when the church met on Bennington. "Carva is a mind manipulator," Hardy says. "He can easily influence people to get whatever his plan is."

Hardy met White, a flamboyant, musically gifted son of a preacher, through an acquaintance. Hardy says he had the idea for starting the church on Bennington, only to watch White make a play to buy the property. "I was dealing with the real-estate agent, and he was dealing with the owner," Hardy says. Eventually, Hardy and White agreed to work together.

Court documents suggest that Hardy chose an irresponsible partner. In 1996, White bought a residence on Hardesty Avenue. But he failed to make payments, forcing the seller to sue and evict him. A furniture store that sued White in 1998 for $5,000 won a judgment, which court records indicate was never paid. In 1999, the city ordered a crumbling church he owned on Indiana Avenue to be demolished; the city then sued to get White to pay $9,018 for the cost of demolition. The city was unable to find White and force him to pay.

White's financial escapades took a criminal turn in 2000 when the U.S. Attorney's Office in Missouri accused him and four other persons of bank fraud. Prosecutors claimed that White and the others opened bank accounts for the purpose of turning forged checks into cash. On November 28, 1997, White deposited a forged check for $1,600 into a New Higher Ground Outreach Ministries account. Three days later, White withdrew $1,504 from the account in a series of ATM transactions.

Even amid his legal troubles, White was still able to perform on Sundays. Hardy says the church on Bennington began to build a membership. Then the disputes started. "Fund-raising was one issue I didn't agree with," Hardy says.

Hardy says White convinced church parents to allow him to put their children to work raising money in the streets. Hardy disapproved of the practice, thinking it inappropriate and dangerous. "All they're doing is running between cars," he says.

Hardy also came to believe that the money raised did not glorify God as much as it allowed White to live a life of leisure. Hardy says he's never known White to have a real job. "The fund-raising is a crap of bull," he says. "It's to help him."

White liked to project a flashy image. Hardy says he was once speaking to another minister, who asked, after meeting White, "Who was that pimp?"

Ultimately, White was forced to trade his fine suits for a prison jumper. After pleading guilty to one count of bank fraud, he received a 13-month prison sentence and was ordered to pay nearly $40,000 in restitution. He reported to Leavenworth on July 16, 2001. He was 37 years old.