Resurfaced Documentary Uncovers Accusations of Child Abuse Against Former Mormon President Gordon B. Hinckley
August 22, 2022
By Derrick Broze
The documentary The True Story of Mormon President Gordon B. Hinckley and its accusations against Mormon Church leadership has not been seen by the public in almost 30 years — until now.
In late May, the Utah County Sheriff’s Office announced an investigation into "ritualized child sexual abuse" in 3 different Utah counties. Following that announcement, The Last American Vagabond (TLAV) produced a series of 5 articles focused on the sheriff’s investigation, as well as claims of child sexual abuse in Utah at large, and within The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS).
In our 5th report we investigated the history of claims of child abuse within the Mormon Church. From the Pace Memo to Paperdolls, accusations of various church members and officials participating in and/or covering up organized sexual abuse of children are not hard to find in LDS history.
On the heels of our reporting on these historical accusations, The Associated Press dropped a bombshell of an investigation which is causing headaches for the LDS. Their reporting shows that church leadership used their "help line" to cover up reports of pedophilia.
The AP obtained almost 12,000 pages of previously sealed records from a child sex abuse lawsuit against the Mormon Church in West Virginia. These documents and testimony from victims make it clear that the so-called help line can "easily be misused by church leaders to divert abuse accusations away from law enforcement and instead to church attorneys who may bury the problem, leaving victims in harm’s way."
The AP reported:
"The father, a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and an admitted pornography addict, was in counseling with his bishop when he revealed the abuse. The bishop, who was also a family physician, followed church policy and called what church officials have dubbed the "help line" for guidance.
But the call offered little help for MJ. Lawyers for the church, widely known as the Mormon church, who staff the help line around the clock told Bishop John Herrod not to call police or child welfare officials. Instead he kept the abuse secret.
Herrod continued to counsel MJ’s father, Paul Douglas Adams, for another year, and brought in Adams’ wife, Leizza Adams, in hopes she would do something to protect the children. She didn’t. Herrod later told a second bishop, who also kept the matter secret after consulting with church officials who maintain that the bishops were excused from reporting the abuse to police under the state’s so-called clergy-penitent privilege.
Adams continued raping MJ for as many as seven more years, into her adolescence, and also abused her infant sister, who was born during that time. He frequently recorded the abuse on video and posted the video on the internet."
Adams was never reported by the church or excommunicated. He was only arrested in 2017 after Homeland Security agents were tipped off by police in New Zealand when one of the videos of sexual abuse was discovered in another pedophile’s phone. Adams would kill himself in police custody before trial.
Some critics argue that the Pace Memo, Paperdolls, and other such accusations are lacking in credibility. Defenders of the church also believe these latest reports of child sexual abuse are only isolated examples.
However, we believe the history of LDS leadership should be examined for signs of similar behavior. If the church is failing to intervene in child sexual abuse in recent years, then we must ask whether there are examples of failure to act — or outright coverups — in the history of the Mormon Church.
The True Story of Mormon President Gordon B. Hinckley
In March 1995, after decades of committing his life to Mormon doctrine, Gordon Bitner Hinckley became the President of the LDS Church. Hinckley would serve until his death on January 27, 2008, at the age of 97. Hinckley’s rise is a story of persistence and being in the right place at the right time.
Hinckley was born on June 23, 1910 to Mormon educator Bryant S. Hinckley and his wife Ada Bitner Hinckley. Due to the influence of his father, it was all but inevitable that the younger Hinckley would follow in his fathers footsteps.
Hinckley’s star began to rise in September 1961 when he became an apostle in the church’s "Quorom of the Twelve Apostles". In this role he served on the First Presidency to the 9th President of the LDS, David McKay.
It was during the 1960s that Hinckley played a major role in expanding the LDS message by facilitating the purchase of shortwave radio stations and TV networks. When the church formed Bonneville International Corporation in 1964, Hinckley was named a vice president, a member of the board of directors, and a member of the executive committee.
It was also during this time that Hinckley is accused of participating in extramarital affairs with prostitutes, men, and young boys.
The accusations against Gordon Hinckley first began to surface in the early 1980s. This was largely due to the investigations of a Mormon man named Bill Claudin who had been pursuing claims of sex affairs relating to Hinckley.
As part of his investigation, Claudin claimed to have interviewed several witnesses and collected signed affidavits testifying to the truth of their statements. These interviews resulted in hours of videotapes which were then edited into short clips and included in a controversial documentary released in 1992 under the name The God Makers II.
While The God Makers II does include small pieces of these interviews, the main focus of the film deals with claims relating to the origin of Mormon rituals and prayers. When The God Makers II was released the LDS community rejected most of its claims, including accusations against Gordon B. Hinckley. The films were made available on VHS and circulated among Utah churches, but are hardly known outside of the LDS Church.
Although the full unedited interviews conducted by Bill Claudin and team have never seen the light of day, an edited version of the investigation and interviews was released as a documentary under the name The True Story of Mormon President Gordon B. Hinckley.
This documentary was distributed among Claudin and associates as they hosted screenings at any church willing to listen. At one point there may have been as many as 3,000 copies of this tape. As of the publishing of this investigation we have been unable to locate more than one physical copy of the tape, and no digital version has been uploaded to the internet. Until now.
In the interest of the historical record, providing a voice to alleged victims, and in the hopes of encouraging more witnesses and/or victims to speak out, TLAV is releasing the documentary in full as originally produced:
The Accusations Against Gordon B. Hinckley
Bill Claudin reportedly began investigating Gordon B. Hinckley sometime in the late 1980s. In the video, Claudin, who was a Mormon, says he was encouraged by other Mormon friends to pursue "the story of truth".
The story Claudin found involved Gordon B. Hinckley and the Hunter brothers, Alvin and Walton, owners of the Hunter Motor Co. car lot, hosting parties which were frequented by prostitutes. These parties allegedly took place at the apartment above the car lot, and another house which was purchased by Hinckley or associates as a safe place to party.
"I know the story is true through 8 months of an investigation. My wife and I have spent untold hours, man hours and dollars, investigating this to find out the truthfulness of what we believe is the highest proportion of hypocrisy that I have ever heard of," Claudin stated at a press conference shown in the video "I think that it should be known by all LSD people and church members."
Claudin, like most of the people involved in the investigation and witness to the alleged activity, is deceased.
Louis Sims, a Hunter Motor Co. employee, speaks in the film describing what he witnessed. Sims states that he knew many of the women who were present at these sex parties and recruited them. He claimed he would typically bring four or five girls to the parties.
"I took a lot of girls to Chuck Van Damme’s house… and a lot of people — that were supposed to be important people, supposed to be good church going people, some of them were bishops, counselors — that I actually seen go in there or leaving there," Sims states on the tape.
Charles Van Damme was the manager of the Hunter Motor Co. for the Hunters. During the recording of the tape, Van Damme was dying from AIDS. He claimed to have had a love affair with Gordon B. Hinckley from "about 1964 to 1966". Van Damme also claims to have seen Hinckley with prostitutes.
Van Damme claimed that Hinckley and the Hunter’s provided the money for him to purchase the house off Lakeline Drive in Utah. "We bought that house for a party pad. And Gordon Hinckley, Alvin and Walton Hunter came up there all the time and I had to arrange women for them, I had to arrange booze for them. I had to arrange everything," Van Damme stated.
Van Damme said he was excommunicated from the LDS by Hinckley in 1970 for being a homosexual.
Another alleged witness to Hinckley and the Hunter’s "party house" was a Mormon man named Ben Pelham. He claims to have been introduced to Gordon B. Hinckley via the Hunters and their manager for the car lot, Charles Van Damme.
"The hunters built an apartment above the car lot, which they held parties at. With both men and women, drinking and carrying on up there, most all the time," Pelham states in the documentary.
Allegations of Abuse of Young Boys
Up to this point the allegations against Hinckley and the Hunters range from violating Mormon norms and customs to infidelity in their marriages. However, the most disturbing of the allegations involve claims of young boys being present at these sex parties.
Ben Pelham was also one of four people who claimed they saw young boys in the apartment and/or house.
"I did see Alvin, Walter, and Hinckley go up to the apartment with prostitutes — I would guess they were prostitutes — and young boys," Pelham stated. "These parties were frequented all the time by the Hunters and Mr. Hinckley and some of the other church officials. And they weren’t there to play poker."
Charles Van Damme also accused Hinckley of having "anal intercourse" with "feminine looking boys".
"Youngsters, Im talking about 15, 16 years old. Just little youngsters, babies," Van Damme said.
Viola Gallo was also claimed to have been at the parties, met Hinckley, and witnessed young boys at a party.
"I remember hearing them saying, calling him Gordon Hinckley and I was introduced to him one time," Gallo said in the film.
"There was a couple of young boys one night at a party. I would say around 15 or 16, and they went off to a bedroom together – Hinckley and the boys, two boys, in fact. And they were in there for quite a while."
Corroborating Witness: Darrel Clegg
The allegations against Gordon B. Hinckley refer to the time period of the mid-1960s, when he was serving as an apostle. However, in the 1980s, when the interviews were being conducted and these films released, Hinckley had been appointed to the First Presidency, serving as counselor to LDS President Spencer W. Kimball.
When Kimball died in 1985, Eza Taft Benson became President of the Church with Hinckley as his first counselor. By time The God Makers II was being released in 1992, Hinckley was taking part in an official visit to Rome to present a copy of the Encyclopedia of Mormonism to the Vatican.
Clearly, Hinckley was an influential and powerful figure in the Mormon Church well before he became President in 1995. Hinckley’s stature in the church makes it all the more likely that the LDS would seek to silence accusations against him.
According to Utah native Darrel Clegg, an associate of Bill Claudin’s who met several of the witnesses, a lawyer representing Hinckley attempted to stop the released of the film.
Clegg provided his version of events in a video testimony recorded in March 2014. He also preserved a VHS copy of The True Story of Mormon President Gordon B. Hinckley. He asked that these not be released until after his death. Clegg passed away in 2017. These tapes were sent to TLAV and used for this investigation.
Claudin also recounts a meeting he attended with Bill Claudin and Patrick A. Shea, attorney for the LDS Church and Gordon B. Hinckley. Clegg says Shea stated, ‘I am here to represent Mr. Hinckley and I want you to come clean and say it didn’t happen.’
"He even offered him money, to pay him off, but Bill said you don’t have enough money to make me lie like that," Clegg states in his testimony.
Clegg says the attorney threatened to sue if the tapes were not destroyed, but once Claudin told him they had printed thousands of copies he threw his hands in the air in frustration. Clegg says that at one point his bathtub was filled with thousands of VHS tapes of this documentary. Clegg claims Claudin was eager to take the case to court because of his collection of sworn affidavits.
Clegg also testified that he was a witness to Claudin’s excommunication from the LDS as a result of his investigation into Gordon B. Hinckley.
Darrel Clegg was one of the few remaining people alive who was involved in different elements of the investigation into Gordon B. Hinckley. Unfortunately, the disturbing history of abuse within the Mormon Church does not stop with him.
As of the time of this publishing, the LDS has not responded for comment.
Daughters of Former Mormon Bishop Walton Hunter Accuse Father of Rape
Posted on August 22, 2022 Author Derrick Broze
The story of allegations of child sexual abuse in the Mormon Church expands from Gordon B. Hinckley to Bishop Walton Hunter.
In the late 1980’s a documentary titled The True Story of Mormon President Gordon B. Hinckley was produced and screened among churches that would dare host the heresy. This film alleges that now-deceased former Mormon President Gordon B. Hinckley engaged in affairs with prostitutes, men, and young boys.
Our previous report placed this documentary in its historical context and outlined the various witnesses involved in the making of the film. One of those witnesses was Louis Sims, an employee of the Hunter Motor Company where some of the affairs are alleged to have happened.
The Hunter Motor Company was owned by brothers Alvin and Walton Hunter. The Hunter’s were also members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS). In fact, Walton Hunter was a bishop for 10 years in Salt Lake City, Utah.
During his interview in the documentary, Louis Sims alludes to his belief that Walton Hunter was given his bishopship in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS) by Hinckley because of their close relationship.
The witnesses in the documentary place both Alvin and Walton Hunter at the alleged sex parties with Hinckley. This implies that Alvin and Walton were either witnesses or participants in what took place at the apartment and house.
Deliver Us From Evil
Walton Hunter died in January 1995 at the age of 75. His obituary reads, "Born October 25, 1920, Enoch, Texas, to Walter W. Hunter and Verna Ann Hall. He was an officer in the Army Air Force during World War II."
It also notes his service with the LDS Church, "He served twice as LDS bishop (Grant 9th Ward, Salt Lake City, 10 years and So. San Jose, Calif. 10th Ward six years). As bishop he was dedicated to missionary work and called many young people to serve missions, giving them complete love and support."
What the obituary does not mention is that Walton Hunter was accused of sexually abusing two of his own daughters and was excommunicated from his 2nd bishopship in San Jose, California as a result of these accusations.
The story of sexual and mental abuse at the hands of Walton Hunter is documented in the book Deliver us from Evil written by his adult daughter, Deborah Hunter-Marsh. Self-published in 2014 by Ms. Hunter-Marsh, the book seems to have gone largely unnoticed, a tragic example of forgotten abuse.
The book doubles as a personal diary with Deborah Hunter-Marsh sharing her father’s family history, his involvement with the church, and, of course, his constant sexual abuse of her and her sister Rebecca. At times Hunter-Marsh seems to be searching for an explanation for her fathers behavior. She writes:
"He did not have a warm, loving home environment as a newborn, filled with the cooing and cuddling that usually comes from a mother and a father. His dad, Walter, detested him and he was called ugly until his teen years and he was beaten severely by his father."
Besides her personal experiences and those of her sister, she also uses her father’s personal journals to tell the story of her family.
"Dad never says anything good in his entire personal journal about his grandfather that took him in, but made special mention of his "loving, kind" Grandma Hall. There were such deficits in his being that he used sex and drugs, lots of prescription drugs for anxiety and what my father called "nervousness." He needed success, both within the church and as a forthright businessman, and he needed lots of sexual attention as well as public notoriety. His goal was to do whatever he wished to do with whomever he wanted to do it with, but to "never get caught." This was evident throughout his journals."
As an adult, Deborah Hunter-Marsh says she began to recall repressed memories from her childhood. Initially, she didn’t believe the nightmares she was having could have been real, or that her father was involved. Eventually, she would come to accept that her father had been raping her since she was a young girl.
"As I recall, my father appeared in the middle of the night and climbed onto my body, hurting my body and soul. I remembered wondering how he could do this to me. My father was a bishop in the Grant 9th Ward and he only did what God told him to do, so if he was raping me, I must be very bad. I was a bad, bad person."
Hunter-Marsh recalls a time when her father’s extramarital affairs with another woman were discovered by his wife who went to their Bishop for help. Walton was almost excommunicated but the bishop allowed him to stay. However, Hunter-Marsh writes that "the truth of how naughty he had been, or was being, came out in little ways in 1964."
Hunter-Marsh discusses the history of the controversial film The Godmakers discussed in our report on Gordon B. Hinckley. She believes the claims regarding her father owning a "party pad" where "prostitutes of every race and gender" would drink, smoke, and have sex with her father and others.
However, while describing the focus of the film, Hunter-Marsh chose not to name Gordon B. Hinckley, instead refer to him as a "high-ranking church official". She says her and her sister, "do not believe that any high Mormon Church official was involved." Still, they do acknowledge their father’s friendship with both Charles Van Damme — an employee of the Hunter Motor Co and alleged lover of Hinckley — and the unnamed Mormon Church official.
Hunter-Marsh also mentions the possibility her father may have laundered money via Van Damme as he claimed. She also hints at potential legal troubles. She writes:
"Checks for $75,000 or more were cashed. I also remember Mother and Father bemoaning the fact that all of Dad’s cars on both car lots were stolen overnight. By whom, I’m not sure, but they mentioned Chuck Van Dam’s name as a possible thief. My parents were extremely upset. Shortly after this, we had to move from our large house up on Idlewild Circle by Mt. Olympus to a small condominium in Granger that we rented for about six months. This move was just out of Salt Lake City, completely across town with no hope of seeing our friends from the Mt. Olympus area forty miles away with both parents working at the time. I think we were in hiding because a few months after we moved into the condominium, we loaded up our car with our clothes and a few personal items and left in the middle of the night to move to California, leaving behind important large or bulky personal items such as our scrapbooks, knickknacks, furniture, etc. We took only what would fit inside two automobiles. Our parents didn’t tell us why, just that we had to move."
Justice Delayed
Deborah Hunter-Marsh says her adult sister Rebecca also began remembering incidents of sexual abuse by her father. In the book, Rebecca states that she confronted her mother and father about the abuse, but they refused to listen. Rebecca continued to allow her children to see their grandparents, but told them they could never be alone at Grandma and Granda’s house.
However, when Rebecca was away one afternoon, her son, called Alex in the book, was left alone in the house with his grandfather. Once he returned to his mother he immediately began displaying various behavioral and learning disabilities. It was later learned that Alex had been sexually abused by his grandfather Walton Hunter. One of Rebecca’s daughters also claims to have witnessed her grandmother, Rebecca and Deborah’s mother, creating the circumstances for the child to be alone with his grandfather.
"Unfortunately, everyone’s sexual abuse was outside the statute of limitations for prosecution criminally, except for Alex’s, but he was only six years old and too traumatized and threatened by his grandfather to testify. He had to be older before he would tell, so we never put him through the trauma of a trial or anything," she writes.
Since there was not a possibility for legal recourse against Walton Hunter, Rebecca went to her father’s "Stake President" in the LDS to see if they could get him removed from his position. Eventually, Rebecca and Deborah participated in a Disciplinary Counsel where they would each testify to twelve men about what they claimed their father had done to them and their children.
"To face a monster and twelve men’s serious faces, judging and examining our facial expressions, our body
language, and our words was dreadful. I very much felt like I was being judged, not Dad," Hunter-Marsh writes.
Following their testimony to the Disciplinary Counsel, they returned home to celebrate their bravery. They received a visit from the Stake President who notified them that Walton Hunter had been excommunicated from the 10th Ward in San Diego, California.
Later, they would learn that Deborah’s daughter Bethany was also molested by Walton Hunter.
After getting Hunter excommunicated from the Mormon Church, his daughters also pursued a civil lawsuit. Before the trial could ever begin in July 1995, Walton Hunter died of a congestive heart failure. The case was settled out of court and Walton’s wife was forced to use his remaining money to pay the settlement.
Deborah Hunter-Marsh says that her mother told her that in his final days, Walton Hunter was scared and restless. He reportedly told his wife he could see "dark figures assembling around him and he was very frightened".
Regarding the potential that her father could have molested other children, Hunter-Marsh writes, "we do know that our father had a candy dish in his church office and the children would go in there to get some each Sunday. There may be other victims we don’t know about or he might have kept it just to the family. If this book finds more victims, we would like to know, and we will try to help him or her as much as we can."
Finally, court records of the civil lawsuit against Walton Hunter further confirm the facts of this case.
The Justice Delayed investigation focused on a late 1980’s a documentary titled The True Story of Mormon President Gordon B. Hinckley. This film alleges that now-deceased former Mormon President Gordon B. Hinckley engaged in affairs with prostitutes, men, and young boys. The film also accuses Alvin and Walton Hunter of being involved with the alleged events.
Our first report placed this documentary in its historical context and outlined the various witnesses involved in the making of the film. The sexual abuse was said to have taken place in two locations, including an apartment above the Hunter Motor Company owned by Alvin and Walton Hunter.
Our second report introduced the story of Walton Hunter’s daughter Deborah Hunter-Marsh and her claims against her father.
BISBEE, Ariz. (AP) — MJ was a tiny, black-haired girl, just 5 years old, when her father admitted to his bishop that he was sexually abusing her.
The father, a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and an admitted pornography addict, was in counseling with his bishop when he revealed the abuse. The bishop, who was also a family physician, followed church policy and called what church officials have dubbed the “help line” for guidance.
But the call offered little help for MJ. Lawyers for the church, widely known as the Mormon church, who staff the help line around the clock told Bishop John Herrod not to call police or child welfare officials. Instead he kept the abuse secret.
“They said, ‘You absolutely can do nothing,’” Herrod said in a recorded interview with law enforcement.
Herrod continued to counsel MJ’s father, Paul Douglas Adams, for another year, and brought in Adams’ wife, Leizza Adams, in hopes she would do something to protect the children. She didn’t. Herrod later told a second bishop, who also kept the matter secret after consulting with church officials who maintain that the bishops were excused from reporting the abuse to police under the state’s so-called clergy-penitent privilege.
Adams continued raping MJ for as many as seven more years, into her adolescence, and also abused her infant sister, who was born during that time. He frequently recorded the abuse on video and posted the video on the internet.
Adams was finally arrested by Homeland Security agents in 2017 with no help from the church, after law enforcement officials in New Zealand discovered one of the videos. He died by suicide in custody before he could stand trial.
The Associated Press has obtained nearly 12,000 pages of sealed records from an unrelated child sex abuse lawsuit against the Mormon church in West Virginia. The documents offer the most detailed and comprehensive look yet at the so-called help line Herrod called. Families of survivors who filed the lawsuit said they show it’s part of a system that can easily be misused by church leaders to divert abuse accusations away from law enforcement and instead to church attorneys who may bury the problem, leaving victims in harm’s way.
The help line has been criticized by abuse victims and their attorneys for being inadequate to quickly stop abuse and protect victims. Yet the Utah-based faith has stuck by the system despite the criticism and increasing scrutiny from attorneys and prosecutors, including those in the Adams case.
“’I just think that the Mormon church really sucks. Seriously sucks,” said MJ, who is now 16, during an interview with the AP. “They are just the worst type of people, from what I’ve experienced and what other people have also experienced.”
MJ and her adoptive mother asked the AP to use only her initials in part because videos of her abuse posted by her father are still circulating on the internet. The AP does not publish the names of sexual abuse survivors without their consent.