{"id":92652,"date":"2025-12-13T01:19:08","date_gmt":"2025-12-13T01:19:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/92652\/"},"modified":"2025-12-13T01:19:08","modified_gmt":"2025-12-13T01:19:08","slug":"alleged-california-cult-leaders-arrested-for-killing-member-3-years-after-he-went-missing-cops","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/92652\/","title":{"rendered":"Alleged California ‘cult’ leaders arrested for killing member 3 years after he went missing: cops"},"content":{"rendered":"

Two high-ranking members of a \u201ccult-like\u201d<\/a> group just outside of Palm Springs were arrested on suspicion of killing one of their members Thursday \u2014 three years after the victim was last seen at a Starbucks.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The group goes by \u201cHis Way Spirit Led Assemblies\u201d and has been under investigation since May 2023 when a former member, Emilio Ghanem, 40, was reported missing shortly after leaving the cult, police say.<\/p>\n

\u201cHis Way Spirit Led Assemblies\u201d cult leader Martin and and his wife Shelly Martin were once arrested on suspicion of possessing illegal weapons, but were not charged. <\/p>\n

Redlands police arrested the alleged leader Darryl Martin, 58, and high-ranking member Rudy Moreno, 43, at the group\u2019s headquarters for murder and gun charges. They are being held without bail.<\/p>\n

The Redlands Police Department scoured a home on Pleasant Street in Hemet, about 45 miles from Palm Springs and around 75 miles from Temecula.\u00a0<\/p>\n

High-ranking member Rudy Moreno was arrested along with Darryl Martin.<\/p>\n

The cultish group is run by Martin and his wife Shelly Bailey \u201cKat\u201d Martin, who calls herself a \u201cprophetess,\u201d according to ABC7<\/a>. An ex-member told KTLA<\/a> the group stored packaged food, water and other supplies meant to last for years in preparation for the end times.<\/p>\n

Ghanem\u2019s family said he was a devout member of the religious group for two decades. He started a pest control company in Nashville and then went back to California to open a satellite office. Members worked at this pest control at this company called Fullshield Inc., now known as \u201cMaxguard,\u201d according to the Redlands Police Department. The pest control company did not reply to The Post\u2019s request for comment.<\/p>\n

Ghanem was last seen driving a rented Nissan Frontier pickup truck by surveillance cameras captured in Grand Terrace. Redlands Police Department<\/p>\n

All the funds would be given to the pastors, which was reportedly making over $2 million a year, a former member told media outlets.<\/p>\n

Ghanem was last seen driving a rented Nissan Frontier pickup truck by surveillance cameras captured in Grand Terrace.<\/p>\n

His disappearance was considered a missing persons case until Aug. 1, 2025, when the case turned into a possible homicide after Redlands police found Ghanem\u2019s truck, KTLA reports<\/a>. Inside, evidence and personal items were found.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The group goes by \u201cHis Way Spirit Led Assemblies\u201d and has been under investigation since May 2023 when a former member, Emilio Ghanem, 40, was reported missing.\u00a0 Redlands Police Department<\/p>\n

On Aug. 27, Martin and his wife were arrested<\/a> once before on suspicion of possessing illegal weapons, but were not charged. His wife was released because of a \u201cmedical episode,\u201d police say.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Martin is possibly connected to the death of a 4-year-old child in Colton and the disappearance of two men.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Two high-ranking members of a \u201ccult-like\u201d group just outside of Palm Springs were arrested on suspicion of killing…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":92653,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[7,9,8,8946,3247,3586],"class_list":["post-92652","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-california","tag-california","tag-california-headlines","tag-california-news","tag-cults","tag-missing-persons","tag-us-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/92652","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=92652"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/92652\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/92653"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=92652"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=92652"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=92652"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}