Donnie McClurkin, the Grammy-winning gospel singer and minister who has publicly denounced homosexuality, has been sued for sexually abusing his former male personal assistant. <\/p>\n
McClurkin, 66, faces allegations of sexual assault, sexual battery and more in the civil lawsuit filed Friday in New York County Supreme Court. The singer\u2019s accuser, identified in court documents as Giuseppe Corletto, accuses McClurkin of sexually assaulting him numerous times from the start of his employment in 2004 to 2015. The complaint also includes an alleged email from the singer, in which he apologizes for his actions and writes, \u201cI am the actual epitome of a desperate dirty \u2018old man.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n
A legal representative for McClurkin denied the allegations as \u201ccategorically false.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cAt no time did Pastor McClurkin engage in any form of sexual abuse, assault, or sexual coercion of Mr. Corletto,\u201d McClurkin attorney Gregory S. Lisi said in a statement shared Tuesday. \u201cThe claims set forth in the lawsuit grossly mischaracterize their interactions, which occurred over a decade, and some accusations over 2 decades, ago. All these allegations are contradicted by the real facts.\u201d<\/p>\n
Lisi added: \u201cPastor McClurkin denies each and every allegation of wrongdoing and intends to vigorously defend against this lawsuit through the appropriate legal process. As this is now active litigation, Pastor McClurkin will not be commenting further at this time.\u201d<\/p>\n
The lawsuit claims Corletto was 21 years old and struggling with his sexuality when he met McClurkin, known for songs \u201cI Call You Faithful\u201d and \u201cWait on the Lord,\u201d in August 2003. Corletto attended a reading for McClurkin\u2019s 2001 book \u201cEternal Victim, Eternal Victor,\u201d centered on the singer\u2019s experience of \u201cbeing delivered on homosexuality,\u201d and met the singer, according to court documents. Corletto sought guidance from the Grammy winner, who hired him as a personal assistant.<\/p>\n
The two men developed a mentor-mentee relationship and engaged in \u201cpray the gay away\u201d spiritual sessions \u201cduring which Defendant McClurkin groped Plaintiff\u2019s genitals\u201d without consent, according to the lawsuit. McClurkin had also allegedly \u201cset up scenarios\u201d between Corletto and other men and framed them as \u201ctests from God.\u201d<\/p>\n
In 2007, Corletto and his girlfriend traveled with McClurkin and the singer\u2019s family to California, where the artist allegedly sexually assaulted Corletto in a hotel room. The lawsuit alleges that McClurkin exposed himself to Corletto before pulling him onto a bed, forcefully kissing and grabbing his body and forcing Corletto to engage in anal sex. When Corletto confronted his boss about the alleged assault, McClurkin allegedly said he had no recollection and blamed Corletto\u2019s behavior on medication. The singer \u201cfurther manipulated Plaintiff, blaming him for the incident and convincing him that he was the sole culpable party,\u201d confusing Corletto, the lawsuit said. <\/p>\n
The lawsuit alleges that McClurkin \u201cexploited this tactic repeatedly, coercing Plaintiff into further unwanted sexual acts over the next six years,\u201d including numerous alleged incidents while he was working at McClurkin\u2019s church. The complaint details additional accounts of alleged sexual assault from 2007 to 2008. <\/p>\n
Corletto had attempted to stop working for McClurkin multiple times, the lawsuit said, but the singer refused, telling his assistant \u201cthat his \u2018deliverance\u2019 and \u2018purpose\u2019 were tied\u201d to him. The complaint adds that Corletto told several church staff members of the alleged sexual assault, but that \u201cno action was taken.\u201d Corletto stopped working for McClurkin in 2008, but continued running into the singer in the following years, the lawsuit said. <\/p>\n
The \u201cAgain\u201d artist allegedly sexually assaulted Corletto in 2012 in Orlando, where the latter was training for an airline job. McClurkin learned of his former employee\u2019s location through one of Corletto\u2019s friends and appeared at his hotel room. The lawsuit alleged McClurkin said he needed to talk to Corletto, who \u201creluctantly agreed to let\u201d the singer into his room. Inside the hotel room, McClurkin allegedly \u201cbegged Plaintiff to have sex with him \u2018one last time,\u2019\u201d but Corletto refused. Corletto alleges he woke up to find McClurkin masturbating and touching his body before the singer \u201cforced himself again onto Corletto\u201d and raped his former employee, the lawsuit says. <\/p>\n
Corletto returned to McClurkin\u2019s church in the summer of 2013 and joined the singer during a trip to Niagara Falls. McClurkin allegedly sexually assaulted Corletto again and days later sent an email apologizing for his actions, a screenshot included in the lawsuit shows. In addition to likening himself to a \u201cdesperate dirty \u2018old man,\u2019\u201d per the lawsuit, McClurkin allegedly wrote to Corletto, \u201cI forced myself on you … groping you … and when I think about it … you never touched me like that at all.\u201d McClurkin also allegedly promised to be a friend and pastor to Corletto. <\/p>\n
Two years after McClurkin sent the alleged email, Corletto returned to the singer\u2019s church amid his struggles with mental health. The lawsuit claims McClurkin engaged in further sexual misconduct, \u201ctaking advantage of Plaintiff\u2019s vulnerability and current fragile mental state.\u201d<\/p>\n
Corletto \u201csustained injury, emotional distress, physical pain, emotional pain and suffering, and loss of enjoyment of life\u201d as a result of the sexual assault, the complaint said. He seeks a jury trial, an unspecified amount in compensatory damages, legal fees and additional damages.<\/p>\n
Times editorial library director Cary Schneider contributed to this report.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Donnie McClurkin, the Grammy-winning gospel singer and minister who has publicly denounced homosexuality, has been sued for sexually…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":122879,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[9574,64380,41867,7323,35636,729,64377,37338,48,52,51,47,50,49,64378,64379,1437,15836,2531,7091,72],"class_list":["post-122878","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-los-angeles","tag-allegation","tag-alleged-email","tag-assistant","tag-church","tag-civil-lawsuit","tag-complaint","tag-giuseppe-corletto","tag-hotel-room","tag-la","tag-la-headlines","tag-la-news","tag-los-angeles","tag-los-angeles-headlines","tag-los-angeles-news","tag-mcclurkin","tag-pastor-mcclurkin","tag-plaintiff","tag-sexual-abuse","tag-sexual-assault","tag-singer","tag-year"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/122878","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=122878"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/122878\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/122879"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=122878"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=122878"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=122878"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}