December 12 1994

ARTICLE TOOLS

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* The U.S. Supreme Court has upheld the conviction and five-month jail sentence of Operation Rescue founder Randall Terry on a contempt-of-court conviction. The charge stems from pro-lifer Harley Belew showing a 20-week-old human fetus to Bill Clinton at the 1992 Democratic National Convention in New York. Even though Terry was not at the scene, he was convicted of "aiding and abetting" Belew. Prosecutors said Terry, who began serving the sentence November 9, had been responsible for allowing his followers to disobey a federal injunction barring Operation Rescue from "presenting or confronting" Clinton "with any fetus or fetuses or fetal remains."

* Tony Alamo, a 59-year-old evangelist with a ministry to drug abusers and the homeless, has been fined $210,000 and sentenced to up to six years in prison following his conviction by a federal jury in Memphis for understating his income for 1985 and failure to file tax returns for 1986 through 1988.

* C. Charles Van Ness, president and chief operating officer of Cook Communications Ministries International (formerly David C. Cook Foundation), will retire January 1. Van Ness, who has been with the Elgin, Illinois-based company since 1962, became president in 1989 when David C. Cook III retired. He will continue as a trustee, a post he has held since 1967.

* A federal court decision requiring several ministries to return money donated by an insolvent benefactor has forced one of the groups, Proclamation International (PI), to cease operations. The Pensacola-based mission to developing countries, which was ordered to return $51,228, will retain its corporate status while its lawyer appeals the ruling. "We're not totally out of existence," says Don Dunkerley, pi's executive director. ...