Tony Alamo

534
Tony Alamo bigraphy, stories - Fraudster

Tony Alamo : biography

September 20, 1934 –

Tony Alamo (born Bernie Lazar Hoffman; September 20, 1934) is an American religious leader and convicted child sex offender.Singer, Margaret, Janja Lalich, Cults in Our Midst (Jossey-Bass Publishers, 1995) p.87 He and his late wife Susan are best known as the founders of an organization currently known as Tony Alamo Christian Ministries. The organization is based in and around the towns of Fouke and Alma, Arkansas, United States,Alamo Christian Ministries’ directs inquiries to a Texarkana, Texas post office box. The Alamo Ministries compound is in Fouke, Arkansas and has been referred to as a cult. On July 24, 2009, Alamo was convicted on 10 counts of interstate transportation of minors for illegal sexual purposes, rape, sexual assault, and contributing to the delinquency of minors.AP Wire Stories www.ap.comFederal Verdict Slip http://i.cdn.turner.com/cnn/2009/images/07/24/tony.alamo.verdict.pdfCNN Breaking News Coverage http://www.cnn.com/2009/CRIME/07/24/arkansas.evangelist.trial/KHTV Little Rock (Local Coverage) http://www.todaysthv.com/news/local/story.aspx?storyid=88474&catid=238 On November 13, 2009, he was sentenced to the maximum punishment of 175 years in prison.United Press International (UPI) http://www.upi.com/Top_News/2009/07/24/Tony-Alamo-convicted-of-sex-charges/UPI-37741248464065/http://www.ktbs.com/news/alamo-gets-maximum-175-year-sentence He is currently incarcerated at United States Penitentiary, Tucson in Tucson, Arizona, with the Federal Bureau of Prisons ID number 00305-112.Federal Bureau of Prisons Inmate Locator http://www.bop.gov/iloc2/InmateFinderServlet?Transaction=IDSearch&needingMoreList=false&IDType=IRN&IDNumber=00305-112&x=84&y=9

Life and career

Hoffman was born in Joplin, Missouri, to Jewish Romanian parents in 1934.. Central Arkansas Library System As a child he moved with his family to Montana, where he was briefly employed as a delivery boy for Helena’s Independent Record newspaper.. Montana Human Rights Network] In the early 1960s, Hoffman moved to Los Angeles, California, where he assumed the names Marcus Abad and Mark Hoffman and pursued a career in music, mounting a major publicity campaign to hype singer Bobby Jameson in 1964.. Accessed 16 April 2011 He was briefly incarcerated for a weapon-related offense.

Hoffman married Helen Hagan (born Helen Alice Muller) in 1961. On May 25, 1964, the couple had a son, Mark Anthony Hoffman. While married to Helen, he met aspiring actress Susan Lipowitz (born Edith Opal Horn), a Jewish convert to evangelical Christianity who was nine years older than Hoffman and married to a man whom Hoffman later described as a "small time Los Angeles hood". After both Hoffman’s and Lipowitz’ divorces, Lipowitz and Hoffman married in a 1966 Las Vegas, Nevada, ceremony, and the couple legally changed their names to Tony and Susan Alamo.

Together, the couple established the Tony and Susan Alamo Christian Foundation in 1969 in Hollywood, California. They also manufactured and sold a line of "Tony Alamo" brand sequined denim jackets, a business that eventually landed Alamo in prison for tax evasion."", New York Times, June 12, 1994 Susan delivered the sermons on the Alamos’ syndicated TV program during the 1970s while her husband appeared to sing a gospel song. Susan was later diagnosed with cancer and died on April 8, 1982. Alamo stated she would be resurrected and for six months he had her body on display "while their followers prayed". After 16 years, her body was given to her family."", CNN, September 23, 2008

In 1984, Alamo married Birgetta Oyllenhammer, owner of a clothing design and manufacturing company in Southern California. Tony continued making clothes, under the brand name "Tony Alamo of Nashville", and Michael Jackson was one of his customers, owning two bib shirts of this brand.http://www.gottahaverockandroll.com/LotDetail.aspx?lotid=3786&searchby=0&searchvalue=None&page=0&sortby=0&displayby=2&lotsperpage=25&category=197 He then married Elizabeth Amrhein. After a custody battle, they lost control of her children. For a time Alamo had a retail store in Nashville, Tennessee, called The Alamo of Nashville. Alamo was convicted of federal tax evasion in 1994. He completed a prison sentence and was released on December 8, 1998. He then went to a halfway house in Texarkana.