EATONVILLE (FL)
Sun-Sentinel
By Christopher Sherman
Sentinel Staff Writer
Posted May 17 2005
EATONVILLE -- Four more women have come forward with allegations of sexual misconduct against a minister arrested Friday on charges of sexual battery and false imprisonment, police said Monday.
Lura Williams, 71, an itinerant preacher who built a church in Eatonville in 1969 after initially sermonizing from a tent on the corner of Kennedy Boulevard and Wymore Road, turned himself in to police Friday.
A member of his World Wide Revival Center told Eatonville police that Williams, known at the church as Bishop Williams, asked her to come to the church April 26 to discuss some programs.
In a recreational vehicle parked behind the church, a report said, Williams lured the woman to the back, pushed her onto the bed and raped her. She broke away once, then was pushed down again until she was eventually able to escape, according to a police affidavit filed for the arrest warrant.
Williams faced charges for another sexual-assault allegation in 2000, but that case was dropped, Eatonville police Capt. Gene Arrington said. Police were still researching why that case was dropped.