‘Maidens’ cult leader booked into Pine County Jail

Twin Cities Pioneer Press, Minnesota/June 18, 2016

By Frederick Melo

Former Minnesota fugitive Victor Barnard, a religious leader who fled to Brazil to avoid charges of sexually abusing young girls, was bookedSaturday afternoon into the Pine County Jail.

Barnard, 54, faces multiple felony charges alleging criminal sexual conduct, including sexual contact with minors under age 13.

Barnard became the subject of an international manhunt and landed on the U.S. Marshals Service’s “Most Wanted” list after being charged with 59 counts of criminal sexual conduct in April 2014. Prosecutors allege he chose 10 girls and young women from his River Road Fellowship to live apart from their families in a “Maidens Group” and housed them in a camp near Finlayson, 90 miles north of the Twin Cities.

Multiple girls testified he began molesting them when they were 12 or 13 years old and continued doing so for years while keeping them in seclusion.

Barnard was arrested in Brazil in February 2015. Authorities believe he fled there while under investigation in 2012 and lived with a follower in her 30s.

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