Article By Denise Mitchell // EEW Magazine // Church

A woman named Octavia said Atlanta mega church officials have tried to intimidate her into silence for revealing that she was drugged and raped by one of its ministry staffers four years ago.

Pastor E. Dewey Smith’s House of Hope Atlanta, which boasts 15,000 members, is now under scrutiny since Christian journalist, Larry Reid, publicized an interview with the victim.

“I have a confession and the details of what happened, but they covered it up,” Reid told The Christian Post, adding, “There was a rape that occurred.”

Octavia told Reid the assault took place inside a home the ministry helped her acquire “during a vulnerable period of her life.”

On Friday, September 6, Reid said he had been served 29 pages of legal documentation from Pastor Smith’s lawyers containing a subpoena to release all emails, text messages and videos connected to the case. The popular blogger and former pastor said lawyers are trying to intimidate him, but he is not afraid.

The Christian Post report said Octavia told Reid she was ambushed and pressured into signing legal agreements prohibiting her from discussing the rape accusations. Reid said it is commonplace for House of Hope to use signed confidentiality agreements to squelch negative reports that could hurt the ministry’s credibility.

Reid confessed to The Christian Post that, last October, he was “tricked” into signing a confidentiality agreement of his own for $10,000 to stop him from reporting on a child he said Smith fathered out of wedlock in 2017.

Christian Post said a reliable source informed them that Pastor Smith did, in fact, father the child and is current on child support payments. The public document, available for viewing, appears to be a lawsuit filed in Henry County Superior Court in March 2018 to establish paternity and child support.

Additionally, Reid said Smith confessed to him that he was the father of the out-of-wedlock child, but said “he would never claim that child publicly.”