A Destiny Church pastor has been given the sack from her state-funded childcare job and has resigned from her church job tonight as a result of a Campbell Live investigation.
Robyn Edmonds worked for the Open Homes Foundation (OHF), an organisation which places at risk children. Last week Campbell Live alerted Minister of Social Welfare Paula Bennett of a case of alleged sexual abuse associated with one of those children.
Child, Youth and Family removed one child from care and today announced a wider investigation.
Twenty-nine-year-old Joshua Edmonds faces a charge of indecent assault on a 13-year-old girl that was in foster care of the Open Homes Foundation.
Robyn Edmonds, Joshua's mother, is head of the OHF and until today, was a pastor at Destiny Church.
Now, another child of the pastors is alleged to have been sleeping with a foster child, this time a 14-year-old boy.
"What I believed happen is that the pastor's daughter was seeing and had a relationship with one of the Open Home boys and they were in a relationship," says former church member Ben Evans.
"My wife was called in to counsel the whole family on the situation and how to deal with it."
Mr Evans has left the church now, but at the time was married to the OHF's head social worker. He says not only did Lee and Robyn Edmonds know about the alleged abuse, but so did many others in the church.
"Absolutely," says Mr Evans. "They were all going through counselling to try and sort the situation out within Open Homes Taranaki."
Campbell Live tracked down the boy's mother, who confirmed her child was abused by Ms Noble, and said she Robyn and Lee Edmonds barely acknowledged her.
The boy lived at a home for at-risk kids run by Lee Edmonds and a man called 'Duke'. Duke says Rebecca Noble regularly took the boy to a park for sex.
When the affair came to light, the teenager was beaten up by her husband.
Campbell Live visited the homes of the Edmond families. The pastors had recently shifted out, and their adult children were nowhere to be seen - absent since last Wednesday, the neighbours say.
When Campbell Live went to Taranaki on Sunday morning to ask Robyn Edmonds about the investigation into the Open Homes Foundation, the church was surprisingly closed. Apparently church members had gone fishing in the Wairarapa.
Another example of abuse was told to Campbell Live by Randolph Pratt, a former church member. He was returning a CYFS child to a Destiny family after he had run away.
"When he got him back, booted him fair up the date and lifted him off the ground," he says. "We tried to calm the situation down and took the kids all home with us, then this other girl wanted to ring the police but was told to keep quiet about it."
Another church member told Campbell Live Rebecca Noble was sent to Auckland to be counselled by Bishop Brian Tamaki after the alleged affair with the 14-year-old.
Those who have spoken out are pleased CYFS are investigating.
"[The abuse] should be brought to light straight away, because anything that's brought to light doesn't get time to fester in the dark like a mushroom," says 'Pete', a former church member.
"I'd have assumed CYFS were involved quite early on," says Mr Evans. "[She should] come clean about it, really."
"I think she should stand down from being a pastor and from Open Homes till everything is sorted out," says Mr Pratt.
This afternoon, she did. Both Robyn and Lee Edmonds have resigned as Destiny pastors, and the OHF has asked Robyn Edmonds to resign.
They would not comment on whether they had apologised to the alleged victims, but did apologise to Bishop Tamaki for the "adverse effect this situation has had on them".
One more repulsive example of how this cult does nothing more than target, and take advantage of the most vulnerable members of our society.
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