Evangelist hid murdered wife in freezer for four years
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Pastor Dale Morgan
Apr 10, 2010, 1:24:55 AM4/10/10
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Perilous Times
Evangelist hid murdered wife in freezer for four years
* By Melissa Nelson
* From: AP
* April 10, 2010 1:48PM
AN ALABAMA evangelist preacher and former paratrooper has been convicted of murdering his wife and storing her body in a freezer for four years.
After deliberating for one and a half hours, a jury in Mobile also found 39-year-old Anthony Hopkins guilty of rape, sodomy, incest and sexual abuse of a child between the ages of 12 and 16.
Hopkins was arrested in 2008 while preaching at a rural revival on charges that he killed 36-year-old Arletha Hopkins, a mother of eight.
He showed no reaction as deputies handcuffed him and led him from the court.
Children who grew up in his home and who had testified against him stood in the front row and hugged each other and cried as the verdict was read.
"There is nothing pleasing about any of this, it is all very disturbing,'' Ashley Rich, the prosecuting lawyer said.
"A number of children have been harmed and the chances of them fully recovering are slim.''
Authorities said a teenage relative who Hopkins had abused and impregnated led police to the body of his wife in 2008.
Investigators say Hopkins killed his wife in a violent fight in 2004 after she caught him having sex with the teenager.
They said he then stuffed the wife's body into a freezer at the home he shared with her, the couple's six children and two of her children from a previous relationship.
In closing arguments, Assistant District Attorney Jill Phillips said Hopkins terrorised his wife and young children, isolated them and used the Bible to manipulate them.
"He was the supreme commander of his own little army,'' Phillips said.
Hopkins told jurors that he came home on a December evening in 2004 and found his wife dead on the floor, with the youngest of her eight children, an infant, beside her.
"I was shocked and I began to shake her, and I was like 'Letha, Letha are you alright?' I began to shake her, tilt her head back and do CPR,'' Hopkins testified.
Hopkins served in the US Army in Kazakhstan in the late 1990s and earned a medal for his service.
He was arrested in 1998 for being absent without leave from the Army in Fort Bragg, North Carolina, from June 15, 1995, until April 6, 1998.
He testified on Friday that he decided to leave the Army after he got orders to serve in Korea and could not take his family with him.
It was then he said that he had a calling to become an evangelist and began preaching at rural churches and revivals around the South.
He developed a following because many who heard him preach considered him a prophet who could see the future.
Evangelist hid murdered wife in freezer for four years
* By Melissa Nelson
* From: AP
* April 10, 2010 1:48PM
AN ALABAMA evangelist preacher and former paratrooper has been convicted of murdering his wife and storing her body in a freezer for four years.
After deliberating for one and a half hours, a jury in Mobile also found 39-year-old Anthony Hopkins guilty of rape, sodomy, incest and sexual abuse of a child between the ages of 12 and 16.
Hopkins was arrested in 2008 while preaching at a rural revival on charges that he killed 36-year-old Arletha Hopkins, a mother of eight.
He showed no reaction as deputies handcuffed him and led him from the court.
Children who grew up in his home and who had testified against him stood in the front row and hugged each other and cried as the verdict was read.
"There is nothing pleasing about any of this, it is all very disturbing,'' Ashley Rich, the prosecuting lawyer said.
"A number of children have been harmed and the chances of them fully recovering are slim.''
Authorities said a teenage relative who Hopkins had abused and impregnated led police to the body of his wife in 2008.
Investigators say Hopkins killed his wife in a violent fight in 2004 after she caught him having sex with the teenager.
They said he then stuffed the wife's body into a freezer at the home he shared with her, the couple's six children and two of her children from a previous relationship.
In closing arguments, Assistant District Attorney Jill Phillips said Hopkins terrorised his wife and young children, isolated them and used the Bible to manipulate them.
"He was the supreme commander of his own little army,'' Phillips said.
Hopkins told jurors that he came home on a December evening in 2004 and found his wife dead on the floor, with the youngest of her eight children, an infant, beside her.
"I was shocked and I began to shake her, and I was like 'Letha, Letha are you alright?' I began to shake her, tilt her head back and do CPR,'' Hopkins testified.
Hopkins served in the US Army in Kazakhstan in the late 1990s and earned a medal for his service.
He was arrested in 1998 for being absent without leave from the Army in Fort Bragg, North Carolina, from June 15, 1995, until April 6, 1998.
He testified on Friday that he decided to leave the Army after he got orders to serve in Korea and could not take his family with him.
It was then he said that he had a calling to become an evangelist and began preaching at rural churches and revivals around the South.
He developed a following because many who heard him preach considered him a prophet who could see the future.
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