Judge to decide next week whether to remand ‘Bling Bishop’ Lamor Whitehead for violating restraining order
The feds want to throw convicted fraudster “Bling Bishop” Lamor Whitehead in jail ahead of his July sentencing after he allegedly flashed confidential case documents and made veiled threats against one of his accusers — by reciting a Bible verse.
Prosecutors say Whitehead — who was found guilty in March of fraud, attempted extortion and lying to the FBI for bilking an elderly woman out of her retirement savings, among other things — broke a restraining order when he showed off several documents in the April 30 video, according to federal court filings.
On Monday, prosecutors said in Manhattan federal court that the flamboyant 45-year-old pastor from Brooklyn also used a Bible psalm to make veiled threats against Pauline Anderson — the woman he scammed out of $90,000.
“Touch not my anointed,” Whitehead allegedly said, quoting Psalms 105, during an April 30 livestreamed service. The Old Testament scripture can loosely be translated to Whitehead believing he’s beyond criticism as a pastor.
“The court ought to remand Mr. Whitehead,” one prosecutor told Judge Lorna G. Schofield at a Monday hearing. “He is not credible, he cannot be trusted.”
Whitehead tried to rebut the claims in court — where the flashy pastor wore an $1,100 Burberry reversible corduroy-trimmed quilted shell and checked cotton jacket, Louis Vuitton loafers worth $700 and held a Fendi Zucca-patterned rucksack that cost an eye-popping $1,500.
“I did not willfully try to disturb any protective order,” he told Schofield, adding that the press has ruined his reputation by skewering his fashion choices.
“I was ridiculed because of a designer jacket,” he said. “My character has been destroyed.”
He also claimed he thought the documents had been unsealed following the conclusion of his trial.
“I didn’t know those documents would put me in this position,” he said.
His attorney, Declan Murray, added that his client isn’t a flight risk and “has not made any statements encouraging anyone” to go after the Anderson family.
Schofield will decide whether Whitehead stays home or goes to jail on May 20.
Earlier this year, a Manhattan jury found the stylish preacher guilty of not only scamming Anderson, the elderly mother of a parishioner, but also of trying to extort thousands from a Bronx body shop owner to whom Whitehead promised “official favors” from Mayor Eric Adams.
When they opened the trial, prosecutors called Whitehead a “conman who told lie after lie to victim after victim.”
Whitehead, of the Leaders of Tomorrow International Ministries in Canarsie, convinced Anderson to invest her retirement money in a house he claimed he’d buy for her, then fix up.
Instead, he blew the money on personal luxuries from Louis Vuitton, Footlocker and BMW, prosecutors said.
He also tried to get Brandon Belmonte, the body shop owner, to lend him half-a-million dollars in return for favors from the mayor, who Whitehead said will “do whatever I wanted,” they added.
But his constellation of lies caught up with him — and the feds collared him in December 2022.
