Former Champaign church pastor headed to prison

Apr. 11—URBANA — A former Champaign church pastor has been sentenced to 10 months in prison after admitting to bankruptcy fraud and misusing more than $50,000 in federal funds and student loans to finance his gambling habit.

The Rev. Lekevie Johnson was sentenced Monday by U.S. District Judge Michael Mihm in federal court in Urbana.

Mihm ordered Johnson — who has been free on a personal recognizance bond since his guilty pleas this past December — to surrender himself on June 6 to the custody of a prison yet to be determined.

Mihm said he would recommend a prison near the Dallas, Texas, area, as requested by Johnson.

Johnson was further ordered to pay $59,358 in restitution to the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development and U.S. Department of Education.

After his release from prison, he will be subject to three years of supervised release that includes conditions such as refraining from gambling and participating in mental-health counseling and a treatment program for his gambling addiction.

The former pastor of Mount Calvary Missionary Baptist Church (formerly named Jericho Missionary Baptist Church), Johnson resigned his position in November.

"I have blamed no one but myself for my self-inflicted situation," Johnson said in a statement to the judge.

While church trustees were aware of his situation when he resigned, Johnson said he didn't share the details with the rest of the congregation at his last service in November and instead "left in silence" knowing disgrace would be coming to him and his family in a few days.

Johnson also said he's often shown others that the first step to redemption is acknowledging their sins, "and I have done that," he said.

"I accept my sentence and apologize to those I have caused pain and hurt," he said.

Johnson pleaded guilty in December to a three-count complaint charging him with federal program misapplication, student-loan misapplication and making a false statement in his bankruptcy case.

In one of his guilty pleas, Johnson admitted using some of the federal grant funds provided by the city of Champaign to Life Line Champaign — a nonprofit organization of which he was an officer — for his own personal use, "including by making numerous ATM cash withdrawals at various casinos."

Life Line Champaign was created to be an enrichment program for students in the Garden Hills neighborhood, and Johnson signed agreements with the city for the group to provide programming at his church at 1601 Bloomington Road, C.

Johnson also pleaded guilty to using more than $30,000 in federal student aid for "non-educational expenses," including gambling at casinos.

He further pleaded guilty to making a false statement at his bankruptcy hearing in 2020, stating under oath that he didn't receive compensation from the church other than a paycheck, that all the payments he received from the church were stated on his W-2 tax forms and that he had no control over the church's finances or oversight of church funds when he knew he had control over the church's finances.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Eugene Miller and Johnson's attorney, Steve Beckett, agreed on the restitution amount Johnson will have to pay, but Miller asked for a 12-month prison sentence while Beckett asked that his client serve his time in community-based confinement.

Miller said he was requesting a sentence at the bottom end of the range for Johnson's offenses, saying Johnson had accepted responsibility.

"The defendant does have a history of good works," Miller said.

However, Johnson also took money from a program intended to help disadvantaged youths and abused his position of trust, Miller said.

He also said Johnson's offenses weren't a one-time lapse.

"This was ongoing fraud that the defendant was engaged in," he said.

Miller called three witnesses, including FBI forensic accountant Chelsea Kalaskie, who testified about bank deposits made to accounts controlled by Johnson, and University of Illinois Vice Chancellor for Student Affairs Danita Brown Young, who began attending Johnson's church in 2019.

The third witness, former church member Porter Halcrombe, is a former church deacon who was among those who tried to remove Johnson as pastor and who, along with several others, was ousted from the church via notice delivered by a law firm representing Johnson.

Beckett called just one witness, former Champaign police Chief Anthony Cobb, who testified that Johnson was among the pastors in the community who came to help police at Market Place Mall during a riot and looting that began May 31, 2020.

Beckett said Johnson's conduct that day showed the true nature of his character.

He also said Johnson has a gambling addiction, and "he's in the process of trying to get help."

Mihm said it was a difficult case to determine what a just sentence should be, in light of both Johnson's offenses and the good he's done for others.

"I have seen people in here who have done a lot of bad and not much good. You've done both," he said.

Mihm told Johnson he did some good with the Life Line program, but at the same time, he was stealing from the program.

"The bottom line on your criminal conduct is that it was pervasive during a rather long period of time," he said.

The judge said Johnson appears to have made choices as an addict, "but they were choices."