Million-dollar sexual assault lawsuit filed against Arlington church and pastor
The woman who accused an Arlington pastor of sexual assault last June has filed a lawsuit against the pastor and the church, according to court documents.
The woman is seeking over $1 million in damages from Koinonia Christian Church and its pastor Ronnie Goines, according to the suit filed Feb. 28 in Tarrant County.
In the suit, the accuser details how Goines allegedly groomed her after she began attending the church in August 2022.
After she asked a question at the church's Bible study, Goines invited the woman to see him privately, according to the lawsuit.
During that meeting, Goines told the woman that she 'needed to learn how to trust again' and that it was 'essential for her to be part of a community and receive counseling,' the suit states.
Beginning in January 2023, Goines repeatedly tried to contact the accuser, calling her multiple times and texting her, she said. In March of that year, the woman alleges that Goines sexually assaulted her on two separate occasions at his home, according to the lawsuit.
🚨 More top stories from our newsroom:
→ Rapper, child dead in shooting at Forest Hill car wash
→ North Texas assesses storm damage after tornado watch
→ These parents are trying to save their kids' school
[Get our breaking news alerts.]
Goines turned himself in to Tarrant County authorities in July 2024, the Star-Telegram previously reported. He was charged with one count of sexual assault and one count of indecent assault. The criminal charges are still pending, with the next hearing scheduled for May, according to court records.
Officials with Koinonia Christian Church did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the lawsuit Wednesday.
Goines returned to the church in October to continue preaching and is listed as the lead pastor on the church's website.
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
New York Post
21 minutes ago
- New York Post
Police still investigating death of Brett Gardner's 14-year-old son as potential homicide
Costa Rican authorities are still seeking answers in the tragic death of Miller Gardner. The 14-year-old son of ex-Yankees star Brett Gardner died at Arenas Del Mar Beachfront & Rainforest Resort on March 21, with investigators continuing to determine if the cause will be homicide. 'The purpose of the investigation is precisely to determine whether or not we are dealing with a possible homicide,' a spokeswoman for the Prosecutor's Office of Costa Rica told ESPN on Thursday. 'For this reason, it is not possible at this time to confirm or rule out that a crime has been committed.' 3 Miller Gardner, 14, was vacationing with his family in Costa Rica when he died from carbon monoxide poisoning. Gardner died of carbon monoxide inhalation according to a toxicology report in early April, which noted 'high levels' of the noxious gas in his hotel room, which was adjacent to a mechanical room. The resort denied the validity of a report by the Judicial Investigation Agency of Costa Rica that revealed high levels of carbon monoxide in the Gardner family's hotel room, saying that the high levels were confined to the machine room. Authorities are seemingly still in the first stage of their criminal procedure of collecting and analyzing evidence, with a potential second stage involving formal charges before a trial. Gardner was initially theorized to have died from asphyxiation in his sleep after choking on vomit after food poisoning, but was later revealed to have no windpipe blockage. 3 Miller Gardner (second from right) was the son of Yankee great Brett Gardner (right). The Gardner family has not commented on Miller's death since publishing an obituary for the teen on March 31. 'The void Miller's passing leaves in the hearts of his family, friends, teammates, teachers, coaches and others will be felt for years,' the family wrote. 'Miller's time here with [his friends and family] was brief, but his spirit will carry on forever through those who were impacted by the way he lived. Miller was so blessed with experiences and friendships in his 14 years, and would want other children to have the opportunity to create their own wonderful memories.' 3 Yankees' Brett Gardner during a 2021 game against the Blue Jays. for the NY POST Brett Gardner, 41, played the final of his 14 MLB seasons with the Yankees in 2021. He won the 2009 World Series with the team, collecting an All-Star appearance and a Gold Glove throughout his career, all spent in The Bronx.
Yahoo
an hour ago
- Yahoo
Canadian Securities Administrators encourage Canadians to look out for deceptive social media investment scams
CALGARY, AB, June 13, 2025 /CNW/ - In recognition of World Elder Abuse Awareness Day (WEAAD) on June 15, 2025, the Canadian Securities Administrators (CSA) is encouraging Canadians to connect with older adults in their lives to talk about the growing trend of artificial intelligence (AI) and social media investment scams targeting seniors. "Older Canadians are often the target of financial scams and, more recently, fraudsters have been using AI to make the ads appear legitimate," said Stan Magidson, Chair and CEO of the Alberta Securities Commission and Chair of the CSA. "By asking questions and starting important conversations about the warning signs of scams, we can help support the financial wellbeing of the seniors in our lives." Scams leverage AI to create seemingly credible ads and online profilesScam artists commonly target older Canadians with fake investment opportunities online. Taking advantage of advertising channels through social media platforms, and the openness of people to new relationships fostered through dating or friendship apps, fraudsters can easily and quickly create online personas to deceive and manipulate potential victims with realistic-looking investment opportunities. The CSA urges older Canadians and their loved ones to remember the following tips: Avoid investment opportunities promoted online, especially those seemingly endorsed by celebrities or political figures or those that advertise lucrative, easy or quick returns. Imagery, video and voices can be easily generated with AI to look and sound real. Be cautious of online investing groups claiming to be run by investment professionals. Fraudsters will commonly direct potential victims to move their communications to chat groups created on WhatsApp, Telegram and Discord to keep conversations private and harder to trace. Be mindful of any new online connection, acquaintance or perceived love interest who asks probing questions about your finances or plays off your anxieties or fears when offering you an unrequested investment opportunity. All investment firms and their advisors in Canada are required to ask each of their clients to name a Trusted Contact Person (TCP). Sharing the name of someone you consider to be a trusted contact can help protect your accounts and give you peace of mind. Any individual or firm offering you investments needs to be registered with provincial or territorial securities regulators. You can check registration at but remember that images, voice calls and video meetings can be AI manipulated. It is strongly advised that you do not send money to anyone you have not met in person or whose identity you cannot confidently validate. Foster awareness and digital literacy AI continues to evolve rapidly, and so do the scams that use this technology. To safeguard your financial accounts and empower yourself and those you care for, the CSA recommends taking time to learn how AI is being used across the digital landscape for investing purposes. The CSA has a number of investor tools and resources available online to help Canadians become more informed investors. Investors can follow @CSA_News on X (formerly Twitter), @ on Facebook and subscribe to the CSA's Investor Alerts. Suspect you or someone you know is a victim of an investment scam?If you feel like you or someone you know has been approached or is a victim of fraudulent investment, contact your local securities regulator. The CSA, the council of the securities regulators of Canada's provinces and territories, co-ordinates and harmonizes regulation for the Canadian capital markets. For media inquiries: Ilana KelemenCanadian Securities Administratorsmedia@ SOURCE Canadian Securities Administrators View original content to download multimedia: Sign in to access your portfolio
Yahoo
an hour ago
- Yahoo
Some Mother Emanuel Families Say the Focus on Forgiveness Has Cost Them Justice
Malcolm Graham says that his sister's body was still in the morgue when he noticed that people were rallying around the importance of forgiving her killer. A librarian who loved her community, Cynthia Graham Hurd was one of the nine Black worshippers who were fatally shot on June 17, 2015, at Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, South Carolina. She and other church members were in the middle of a Bible study session when the gunman walked into Mother Emanuel, sat with them for 45 minutes, and then opened fire. Malcolm Graham, who moved to Charlotte, North Carolina, for college, was getting ready for bed when he saw a news report about a shooting at the church that's been a haven for his family for more than half a century. After he learned that his sister had attended Bible study at Mother Emanuel that night and couldn't be found, he began preparing for the worst. Within days, some of the victims' family members said that they had forgiven the gunman, stressing that 'hate won't win,' and political leaders praised this spirit of forgiveness. Graham underscored that he respects that everyone walks in their faith differently. He also appreciates that, sometimes, forgiving is more about helping a victim's loved ones to move on than about absolving a perpetrator of their sins. Even so, in the 10 years since the shooting, Graham and others in the Mother Emanuel community feel as if the focus on forgiveness has come at the expense of crucial conversations on issues such as the ongoing dangers of racism and political action that might protect against hate crimes. 'I didn't forgive then, and I don't forgive now,' Graham, a member of the Charlotte City Council, told Capital B. He added that 'we need to ask tough questions' about discrimination and hatred — for instance, examine the radicalization that continues to occur through fringe online platforms — even if we have to sit with the discomfort of the answers. But that hasn't really happened, he said, 'because people want to race to forgiveness.' The other victims of the 2015 shooting were the Rev. Sharonda Coleman-Singleton, Susie Jackson, the Rev. DePayne Middleton-Doctor, the Rev. Clementa Pinckney (who also was a state senator), Ethel Lance, Tywanza Sanders, the Rev. Daniel Simmons, and the Rev. Myra Thompson. Busts memorializing the victims — who are known as the Emanuel Nine — were recently unveiled at Allen University, a historically Black school in Columbia, South Carolina, where many of them had connections. The university's Boeing Institute on Civility, which sponsored the project, said in a statement that the occasion 'represents both an act of tribute and a renewed commitment to confronting hate with hope.' This is a mission that the Emanuel Nine Memorial also embraces. Like Graham, Pinckney's wife is adamant about grappling with difficult conversations. Jennifer Pinckney and the couple's younger daughter, Malana, who was 6 years old at the time, survived the shooting by hiding under a desk in a church office while the gunman slaughtered the worshippers. In the years since, Pinckney, who has said that she has struggled with forgiveness, has been in the vanguard of a push to hold social media companies liable for how racism is incubated and spread online. The Pinckney family has asked the U.S. Supreme Court to hold Facebook responsible for allegedly radicalizing the gunman, challenging legislation that broadly protects platforms from having to answer for content published on their sites. The family contends that though Facebook 'does not create extremists out of whole cloth,' it 'also is not just a fabric store' — its algorithm gave the gunman racist propaganda that 'led to the real-world consequence' of mass murder. Earlier this year, the family experienced a legal disappointment when the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit ruled 2-1 that the law affords Facebook immunity from liability for the content its users post. A strong opinion from the dissenting judge encouraged one of the family's attorneys to appeal the case to the Supreme Court, according to The Post and Courier. It could be months before the high court decides whether to hear the appeal. Alana Grant — Simmons' granddaughter — also is frustrated with the attention that forgiveness receives in the conversation around Mother Emanuel when political action in response to the shooting has lagged. It was a powerful move of the Holy Spirit, Grant told Capital B, for Nadine Collier to forgive the gunman mere days after he killed her mother, Ethel Lance. Lance was a church sexton, and just after the shooting, the cloud of despair hanging over Charleston was still as thick — and as oppressive — as the city's humidity during the summer. 'However, I believe that we have to stop weaponizing forgiveness and trying to use it as a tool to circumvent accountability,' Grant said. 'The Lord asks us to forgive, but he also asks us to take responsibility for our actions. I've been on my journey to forgiveness and healing, but people don't realize how much more difficult they make it when they focus on forgiveness, or they suggest that there's a certain way a community should respond to victimization.' Something Grant wants, she explained, is state hate crime legislation. Though most states have laws that explicitly address hate crimes — or acts motivated by bias against an identity category — South Carolina is one of the last remaining states without such laws. Reported hate crimes in South Carolina have ballooned by 77% in recent years, from 65 incidents in 2022 to 115 incidents in 2023, per the U.S. Department of Justice. On its website, the agency notes that 'even if a state or territory does not have a hate crimes law, hate crimes can still be reported to the Federal Bureau of Investigation,' since there are federal hate crime laws. One of those laws, the Matthew Shepard and James Byrd Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act, is named after a gay Wyoming student and a Black Texas man who were murdered in separate acts in 1998. In 2017, the Charleston gunman became the first person in the U.S. to be sentenced to death for a federal hate crime. Still, many want a state hate crime law, given that the federal government has limited time and resources and that states conduct the vast majority of criminal prosecutions. Grant's husband, South Carolina state Rep. Hamilton Grant, said that it's unconscionable that South Carolina has no state hate crime law a decade after the shooting. Such legislation won't root out underlying prejudices, he acknowledged, but it can offer Black Americans stronger protections and options after experiencing hate violence. 'There seems to be no appetite to pass state hate crime legislation,' Grant told Capital B. 'When a hate crime bill has been introduced before, it's been introduced in the House, and it would pass the House, even with a Republican majority. But then it always gets hung up in the Senate. Just imagine the disrespect of a senator [Pinckney] being murdered — and his colleagues not even giving the bill so much as a hearing.' Opponents of the measure usually say very little, allowing it to quietly fade away, according to the Associated Press. Grant shared that he wonders whether some legislators worry that backing a hate crime bill might be viewed as supporting diversity, equity, and inclusion and 'wokeness' — which the Trump administration is fiercely pushing back against — and invite a primary challenge in the ruby-red state. 'I don't see anything like this passing the General Assembly,' he said. 'And it's sad and frustrating because though people might believe in the legislation, they feel like they can't publicly support it without losing their power.' While progress on the state level has been glacial, Richland County this month became the first county in South Carolina to pass a hate crime ordinance. This makes it illegal for someone to cause fear, intimidation, harm, or damage to a person or their property because of their race, gender, sexual orientation, and other identity characteristics. In the decade since the tragedy, Mother Emanuel has become a point of pilgrimage, a destination for people who visit Charleston. 'The church is a very special and tragic location,' Bernard Powers, a professor emeritus of history at the College of Charleston, told Capital B. 'When people visit friends or relatives who live in Charleston, those residents will frequently take them to the site if they haven't been there. If you're showing people around, this is one of the places you don't want them to miss.' He added that the church has become a site of activist meetings, particularly those intended to promote hate crime legislation and stricter gun-control legislation. 'What we didn't appreciate — and what we couldn't appreciate — at that point [in 2015] was that similar events were in the offing,' Powers said, noting the racist killings at a supermarket in Buffalo, New York, in 2022; a Walmart in El Paso, Texas, in 2019; and a synagogue in Pittsburgh in 2018. 'There's a murderous trajectory that we've been on.' It's this deeper appreciation of the wider environment of hate that Graham, the Charlotte city councilman, hopes the country will embrace. 'Martin Luther King Jr. said when he gave a eulogy after the 16th Street Baptist Church bombing to pay less attention to the killer and more attention to the system that produced the killer,' Graham explained. He added, 'What system failures let this young guy become filled with so much hate — and then get the opportunity to act on that hate? My sister would have said, 'I know that I bore the brunt of what happened that night, but this attack was against all of us.'' The post Some Mother Emanuel Families Say the Focus on Forgiveness Has Cost Them Justice appeared first on Capital B News.
