Former Leesburg Excessive College band director Gabriel Fielder is accused of working a "cult-like" group full of scholars at his farm.
A former Florida highschool band chief ran a “cult-like” pupil group that tracked their places across the clock whereas compelling them to pay tithes and labor at his farm to organize for the apocalypse, in response to experiences.
Former Leesburg Excessive College band director Gabriel Fielder and steerage counselor Lenny Finelli each resigned this month after surprising allegations emerged from former college students about “The Elder Council,” in response to The Each day Industrial.
Finelli, who aided Fielder in working the society, was finally accused of inappropriate sexual correspondence with a male pupil whose therapist contacted the varsity to report the allegations earlier this yr.
Elder Council individuals mentioned they had been subjected to manipulation and exploitation by Fielder, who advised them he was a divine presence and hosted common conferences at his 13-acre farm.
“He advised us principally that he had such a detailed relationship with God that it was very, very, very uncommon and unusual for him to get issues flawed,” an unnamed member advised The Industrial. “And his factor was, ‘If I’m flawed, then God’s going to appropriate me, you guys don’t have to appropriate me.”
A preferred and charismatic fixture on the college for a few years, Fielder started the group in 2018 and offered it as an outlet for Bible examine and fellowship.
However the former member mentioned the enterprise quickly took on darker tones, with Fielder escalating management over their private lives and typically talking in tongues throughout makes an attempt at “astral projection.”
Despite the fact that they earned modest adolescent incomes, Fielder demanded common tithes from his members.
He additionally used the Life360 app to trace their places across the clock, explaining that he needed to have the ability to know their whereabouts when it got here time for conferences.
The Industrial reported that Fielder had members carry out handbook labor at his ranch in preparation for a coming apocalypse.
“Truthfully, it was extra doing chores on his farm than it was doing ministry work, however that was how we noticed it,” the previous member mentioned.
Fielder knew that the group’s actions might alarm mother and father and he coached children on learn how to communicate to them about it.
“Don’t describe this like that as a result of your mother and father aren’t open to all of these things but,'” the previous member mentioned Fielder instructed her. “‘They’re going to suppose we’re a cult.’”
Dissenting voices and suspicious family had been dismissed as witches or manipulators. Nonetheless, members lastly started to interrupt free final yr.
The group imploded utterly in latest months when the therapist of a former Leesburg pupil contacted directors a few male in her care.
She mentioned the previous pupil accused Finelli of asking him sexual questions when he was a 17-year-old pupil and later relationship him after he turned 18.
The Industrial mentioned Fielder had Finelli and the previous pupil delete inappropriate textual content messages at one level.
“It rocked me to suppose that I could possibly be in a cult and that all the things in my life is totally flawed,” the previous member advised The Industrial.
Regardless of these regrets, she advised the outlet that she wasn’t satisfied Fielder had sinister intentions.
“However I don’t even know if he understood how damaging he was to all of us. I don’t suppose he does. And I actually don’t imagine it was utterly malicious,” she mentioned.
Reasonably than face disciplinary prices, each Fielder and Finelli resigned from the varsity this month.
They won't face any felony prices and a report by the varsity denied that the society was a cult.
“This group was under no circumstances affiliated with the varsity or the district, and any conferences they might have had had been held off campus,” Lake County Colleges spokesperson Sherri Owens advised reporters after the resignations.
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