Harlem Pastor Accused Of Selling Out Church Says He Did No Wrong

HARLEM, NY — The Harlem pastor accused of selling out his church to a real estate developer — and pocketing thousands of dollars in the process — has hit back in new court filings, saying that he had his church's best interests at heart all along.

Bishop Kevin Griffin is the senior pastor and president of Childs Memorial Temple Church of God in Christ: a house of worship in Harlem that operated for decades out of a four-story building on Amsterdam Avenue near West 147th Street.

Last fall, Attorney General Letitia James's office took Griffin to court, saying that he had secretly pocketed hundreds of thousands of dollars after striking a 2014 deal with developer Moujan Vahdat, who planned to tear down the church and construct a new apartment building that would include space for Childs Memorial.

Prosecutors alleged that Griffin had broken state laws by failing to tell his parishioners about his own stake in the deal, and by amending the sale agreement to give Vahdat more time to complete the project — which remains unbuilt years later.

But attorneys for Griffin argued last week that the state's case has a "fatal" flaw: it "alleges no harm to Childs Memorial at all."

According to Griffin's attorney, the attorney general's complaint lacks any proof that the church's $2 million sale was unfair. In fact, when the state gave Childs Memorial an opportunity to revoke the agreement, the church's board "opted to reaffirm its deal with the Developer," Griffin's attorney, S. Christopher Provenzano, wrote in a Feb. 22 court filing.

Griffin, in a separate affidavit, also insists that he told the board about some of the "finder's fees" he received from Vahdat for helping to facilitate his purchases of other Harlem churches — but does not say whether he disclosed his stake in the Childs Memorial sale.

The pastor's attorneys are asking a judge to dismiss the state's case, which sought to bar Griffin from holding a leadership role in any New York-based nonprofit or charity — though it would allow him to continue serving as a pastor.

The state has until April 1 to reply to the motion by Griffin's lawyers.

Griffin, a New Jersey resident, also holds leadership roles in the Pentecostal Christian church of Antigua and Barbuda, and in the New York state division of the Church of God in Christ — a predominantly Black denomination.

A former theater building, Childs Memorial's Amsterdam Avenue home had a role in history: it was there that mourners gathered on Feb. 27, 1965 for the funeral of Malcolm X, six days after the civil rights leader's assassination.

In the ensuing decades, the building fell into disrepair, with holes opening up in the structure's roof. It was demolished in 2018, following the sale to Vahdat, but the planned apartment building — initially slated to be completed by 2019 — has not materialized. (Childs Memorial has temporarily relocated to a storefront on West 148th Street.)

Ironically, that delay has been welcome for some in the community, who were unhappy with Vahdat's plan for the Childs Memorial site: a building full of studio apartments that he would lease to the city for use as a family shelter.

In a protest last year, community leaders argued that studios would be ill-suited for homeless families, and called on the city to develop permanently affordable housing there instead.

Related coverage: Harlem Pastor Sold Church To Developer While Pocketing Cash: AG