Pastor Is Arrested Over 'Child Witch' Cruelty Claims

The pastor of a London-based African church has been arrested on suspicion of child cruelty after claims that he had been branding children as witches and ordering that they be sent back to Africa where he would pray for them to die.

Pastor Dieudonné Tukala, 40, was held after a raid on his South London home. Mr Tukala, who is married with two children, heads a Congolese church with a congregation of about 400 in Tottenham, North London. Immigration officials are also investigating Mr Tukala, who arrived in Britain in 1999 with an Angolan passport and was granted exceptional leave to remain.

The children of up to ten families are alleged to have been affected at the church, one of more than a hundred Congolese churches in and around the capital. In one example, the BBC reported, a father branded his nine-year-old son with a steam iron. A former church elder told Stickler that he was present when the boy was said to be possessed with evil spirits and alleged that Mr Tukala told the parents to beat him until he confessed to being a witch. Full Story

Related: religion, wicca, pagan