A Nicaraguan pastor was sentenced to 36 years in prison for killing a woman thrown naked onto a fire during an exorcism.
Evangelical pastor Juan Rocha, 23, along with four disciples, was found guilty Tuesday of tyingꦗ up mom-of-two Vilma Trujillo for nearly a 🌠week in February and denying her food and water at the El Cortezal chapel that Rocha ran, AFP reported.
They threw⛦ Trujillo naked into aಞ burning pile of wood to drive the “demons” from her body. Family members eventually rescued her, but she died a week later from the severe burns.
Rocha and the four others – his brothers Tomasa Rocha and Pedro Rocha, and Franklin Jarquin and Esneyda Orozco — testified that they believed Trujillo was possessed but denied killing her.
They blamed the fatal act on divine revelation.
The pastor Rocha belongs to a religious group called the Assemblies of God, which distanced itself from the murder, saying he wasn’t a design🍌ated preacher for the church.
The five men received the maximum 30-year term for Trujillo’sꦆ murder. All but Orozco got six additional years for the wo🀅man’s illegal detention.
“The suffering that Trujillo was subjected to is something no human being should go through,” said Judge Alfredo Silva.
He called the🌞 slaying prem♚editated and said Trujillo trusted the men.
They were also fined $522 each, a🐽 substantial amount in the Central American country where the avera🐼ge monthly salary is less than $400.
Their lawyers vowed to appeal the sentence.
With Post Wire Services