*Brooklyn Bishop Lamor Miller-Whitehead and his wife were robbed at gunpoint during church service in July, and the incident was caught on camera.
The couple was reportedly robbed of more than $1 million in jewelry and Whitehead was later accused of being a scammer. According to the New York Post, he has filed two $20 million lawsuits against two of his alleged haters, a YouTuber named Jives and the online personality Larry Reid.
The bishop claims both men publicly called him a scammer, and that he lost “business deals, church members, and income,’’ the suits say.
Jives (born Demario Q. Jives) reportedly told his 80,000+ YouTube subscribers that Whitehead “is wearing the same jewelry that [he] got robbed in,” according to court papers filed in Kings County court on Friday.
Jives also alleged that Whitehead is “drug dealing” and collaborating with “the Bloods and Crypts.”
The suit calls the YouTuber’s comments “false,” and in his case against Jives, the pastor is seeking “no less than $20,000,000 or such other amount to be proven at trial.”
Meanwhile, Reid reportedly “wrote online that Bishop Whitehead ‘scammed people out of money,’ ” says a separate lawsuit that was also filed in Kings County, according to The Post report.
Whitehead claims Reid’s statements “exposed Plaintiff to public contempt, ridicule, aversion, and/or disgrace.”
In his case against Reid, the bishop is seeking $20,000,000 in damages “or other such amount.”
“I’m a commentator,” Jives said to The Post in response to Whitehead’s lawsuit. “I give commentary on religion, politics, public figures, everything. … We make a lot of jokes, especially about this particular situation, because this guy really is a joke. So for him to try to even file something is egregious.”
He added, “He’s mad because people he’s getting backlash, and I’m like, ‘Dude, you’re doing all this talking about a robbery. Who else in the world is out here having interviews about being robbed?’ ”
Per the report, Reid called Whitehead’s suit “absurd and unfounded.
“The key thing about a defamation lawsuit is you’ve got to show a loss, and you’ve also got to show malicious intent. I just stated what every other outlet stated, so he should be suing them as well,” he said. “There’s no good reputation to defame. He has no case.”
Whitehead’s lawyer, Brian Ponder, told The Post, “The defamatory statements that are being made are affecting the bishop’s business and church and professional duties, so he’s going to very aggressively hold those people accountable that are behind it.”
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