Pastor Turns Bible School Into Labor Camp: Affidavit

Reginald Miller faces up to 20 years on each count
By Neal Colgrass,  Newser Staff
Posted May 26, 2014 3:23 PM CDT
Pastor Turned School Into Forced-Labor Camp: Affidavit
Reginald Miller.   (Mugshot)

The head of a Bible college in South Carolina allegedly made foreign students work at substandard wages and threatened to revoke their visas if they complained, Raw Story reports. Homeland Security Investigations filed the complaint last week against Cathedral Bible College President Reginald Miller, who faces a maximum of 20 years on each count, reports the Sun News. Miller's students allegedly worked full-time or longer—on campus and at his home—for a mere $50 weekly wage. Miller told one student that "if he did not like this work, he could go home or he [Miller] would call the Immigration and Naturalization Service," said the affidavit.

Investigators who interviewed eight students described "a pervasive climate of fear in which their legal status as non-immigrant students was in constant jeopardy, at the sole discretion of Dr. Miller." Students also said they lived in poor conditions, often without air conditioning, heat, or hot water. Miller appeared at a detention hearing on Friday and will remain in home detention wearing a monitoring device as part of his $250,000 bond, the State reports. Miller had been arrested on charges of prostitution and lewdness back in 2006 for exposing himself to an undercover officer at a bathhouse, but authorities expunged his record after he participated in a pretrial intervention program. (More religious school stories.)

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