A Brooklyn preacher and his wife said they lost more than $1 million in jewelry when they were robbed during a Sunday service. According to CNN, police said three people entered the Leaders of Tomorrow church on Sunday to steal the belongings of pastor Lamor Miller-Whitehead and his wife.
Footage from the church showed at least one of the robbers holding a gun on the pastor and interrupting his sermon.
“All right, all right, all right,” Whitehead can be heard saying while raising his hands and lowering himself to the floor.
Speaking to CBS2, Whitehead explained how he pleaded with the perpetrators.
“That — ‘all right, all right, all right’ — is pretty much stating that I don’t want, I’m not going to do anything, right, ’cause I know y’all coming for me, y’all coming straight to me. I don’t want my parishioners hurt,” he told the newsstation. “I got women and children there. As I got down, one went to my wife and took all her jewelry, and had the gun in front of my 8-month-old baby’s face.”
The suspects, according to Whitehead, took every piece of jewelry they could find on him.
“Took off my bishop’s ring, my wedding band and took off my bishop chain, and then I had chains underneath my robe, and he start tapping my neck to see if (there was) anything else — so that means they knew, they watched and they knew that I have other jewelry,” he said.
According to police, about 20 to 25 congregants were present during the service.
“My church is traumatized,” Whitehead said.
The suspects may have entered a white Mercedes-Benz before taking off on foot, police said.
Whitehead, who is offering a $50,000 reward to find the suspects, said he wants justice.
“I want these men arrested,” he said in an Instagram video. “I know somebody knows something and I want to make sure that you all know that I’m invested into this.”
Social media users, however, aren’t showing much sympathy for the pastor. Some are accusing him of robbing from the church.
“U robbing the ppl it’s only right the ppl get u back,” one person commented.
“Never seen a pastor drive a Bentley before,” another Instagram user wrote.
