PEARL RIVER, La. — A priest and two women were charged after they had sex on a church altar and filmed the interaction, police said.
Travis Clark, 37, a former pastor at Saints Peter and Paul Roman Catholic Church, was caught video taping himself having sex with two dominatrices on the church’s altar in September, WWL reported.
The St. Tammany District Attorney’s Office said Clark and the women, Mindy Lynn Dixon, 41, of Washington, and Melissa Kamon Cheng, 28, of Georgia, were charged with institutional vandalism on Thursday.
All three “knowingly vandalizing, defacing, or otherwise damaging property and causing damage valued at over $500 and under $50,000,” District Attorney Warren Montgomery said.
The three were originally charged with obscenity charges because they could clearly be seen from the street but those charges were reduced to the lesser counts of vandalism.
>> Louisiana priest accused of sex acts with 2 women on church altar
“It is clear the State went out of its way to contort the facts of this case in order to fit their own narrative,” Bradley S. Phillips, an attorney for Dixon and Cheng, told WWL. “Once again, they have overstepped their bounds at this nothing more than a thinly veiled attempt to regulate the morality of private individuals. Just because you don’t like something, doesn’t make it criminal. My clients look forward to their day in court as we continue to fight this baseless allegation.”
The altar was removed and burned by the Archdiocese of New Orleans. Archbishop Gregory Aymond consecrated a replacement altar and Clark was removed from the ministry.
“His obscene behavior was deplorable,” Aymond told WWL. “His desecration of the altar in Church was demonic. I am infuriated by his actions. When the details became clear, we had the altar removed and burned.”
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