(RNS) — A controversial Tennessee pastor has claimed federal officials broke down his door and raided his house after former members of his church accused him of financial impropriety.
The Rev. Greg Locke, pastor of Global Vision Bible Church in Lebanon, Tennessee, said he was lying in bed about three weeks ago and heard a knock on the door. Outside, he said, about 60 federal agents had surrounded his house for an early morning raid.
“By the time I got my robe on and got out of the bedroom, a team of federal agents had batter-rammed our front door,” Locke told church members during a service on Sunday (July 12). “In riot gear, they had me on the ground. I was screaming, ‘I’ve got kids in the house, don’t shoot, don’t shoot.”
Locke claimed federal agents told him they were there because of reports of “misappropriated funds” and said agents had search warrants for his home and a church building. Those agents, he alleged, took his cell phone and computers and bank records. It’s not clear which federal agency raided Locke’s home.
“I’m not even telling you what three-letter agency it was,” he told church members.
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The Tennessean newspaper reported that the IRS, and not the FBI, was involved in the raid. It’s also not clear what day the raid took place — Locke claimed it happened three weeks into a six-week sabbatical he had taken following the death of his son in May.
A spokesman for the …