It is not my intention in this article to go into details of the two United Pentecostal Church related sexual abuse cases that will be mentioned here. Those will hopefully be covered in future articles. What I wish to share are my thoughts on how Ronald Earl Bohde, one of their pastors, handled two separate sexual abuse cases, each at a different church. It is infuriating that a pastor can fail to report the sexual abuse of a minor to police and then years later, support a different youth leader who was found guilty of 19 counts of sexual abuse involving four minor girls. Why the UPCI continues to license men who mishandle sexual abuse cases is absolutely mind boggling. It seems they need to toss their 2019 position paper on sexual abuse as words without actions are meaningless. This is Part 40 of an ongoing series about sexual abuse in the United Pentecostal Church (see links at the end).
Ron Bohde was raised in the United Pentecostal Church as his father, Earl S. Bohde was a long-time UPCI minister, going back to the 1950s in Oklahoma and Arizona. Ron graduated from the Salinas High School in 1976 and was a graduate in 1980 of Christian Life College (then known as Western Apostolic Bible College) and has been preaching ever since. He claimed that when he was 24, he turned down an offer to pastor a church in Collinsville, Oklahoma, where he had preached a revival. He has been a pastor in Mississippi, Oregon, and then his present church in Dinuba, California, where he started in late March 2016. While in Mississippi, he also worked as an administrative assistant for the District. In 1999 he became the director of Home Missions of the Mississippi District, which it appears he held for a year.
In the late 1980s, Ron Bohde was pastor of the UPC of the Reservoir in Jackson, Mississippi for a brief time and for about three years in the late 80s to the very early 1990s he was pastor at the Pentecostal Lighthouse Church in Meadville, MS. He then pastored the New Chapel Pentecostal Church in Collins, MS where he remained until 2005. It appears that after this he took a break from pastoring while remaining in Mississippi. In 2008 he became the pastor at Bethel United Pentecostal Church in Hillsboro, Oregon. While in Oregon, he owned Bethel Wood Works, an pen and oil vessel business. During the latter part of Bohde’s time in Oregon, the church had a daughter work in Seaside, Bethel Apostolic, which later folded, followed by another using the same name in Forest Grove, which also closed. In March 2016, Ronald Bohde became the pastor of Calvary Apostolic Church in Dinuba, California, where he remains as of the writing of this article. He is 62 years old.
Why does this article point out the various places where Ron Bohde has been a pastor? It is because, in my opinion and that of others, in two of these churches (Bethel & Calvary Apostolic), there was a sexual abuse case involving a youth leader and each was not properly handled. One cannot help but wonder if similar might have occurred at any of these other churches, and/or if there may have been additional cases at Bethel and Calvary Apostolic, but they never hit the news nor were prosecuted. Let’s take a brief look at these sexual abuse cases where the youth leaders were prosecuted.
“This was a worst-case scenario when it comes to a church and a pastor not cooperating.” – Prosecutor Kevin Barton, regarding the Dylan Ritterman case in Hillsboro, Oregon, and referring to Ronald Bohde.
Pictured below: Convicted sex offender Dylan Ritterman, UPCI Pastor Ronald Bohde, convicted sex offender Victor Becerra.
“Just to mess with their minds- I’m just praying that they get rain, cold and soaked wet, and miserably enjoy their protest.” – UPCI Pastor Ron Bohde, speaking at a church service in 2020, to the applause and laughter of church members. He was referring to a group of protestors comprised of the victims’ family and friends.
The following in bold is what was reported in part by The Oregonian on May 21, 2015 regarding the case against Dylan Ritterman and Ron Bohde’s response and knowledge of one of the victims. Bohde did not report the abuse to police when he first learned of it and was not initially cooperative with police when they were investigating the charges.
“This was a worst-case scenario when it comes to a church and a pastor not cooperating,” Barton said.
Barton said the church’s head pastor first declined to speak with police without a briefing on their investigation, which officers would not provide, and then declined unless his insurance agent could be present.
Finally, the head pastor talked to police and revealed with a “heavy heart” that he had known about the abuse of one of the boys. The teen had told the pastor about the abuse, Barton said, and the pastor told him to document it in a letter. But the boy didn’t speak English well and was incapable of writing a letter in English.
In May 2015, Dylan John Ritterman pleaded guilty to two counts each of attempted first-degree sexual abuse and second-degree sexual abuse of two boys at Bethel United Pentecostal Church, where Ronald Bohde was pastor. Ritterman was a youth and worship leader, minister, he lead services, taught and was involved in the Spanish ministry. It happened when the boys were in their early teens and some of the abuse occurred on church property. There was a third case which was dropped as part of the plea bargain. Ritterman was sentenced to prison for six years and eight months. His earliest possible release date is December 27, 2021.
On May 22, 2015, SNAP issued a statement asking the Portland religious leaders to shun the church leaders and urged law enforcement to press charges against the leaders due to how they handled everything. It stated that the pastor should be harshly punished. Less than a year later, in late March 2016, Bohde left Oregon to pastor the Calvary Apostolic Church in Dinubi, California. One must wonder if this church was made aware of the Ritterman case prior to this.
Ministers should not idly sit back while their colleagues – in any denomination – endanger kids, conceal crimes, rebuff police, and behave in ways that bring shame on people of faith.
When ministers do nothing while other ministers endanger kids, all churches become less safe. – SNAP, May 22, 2015, referring to Ron Bohde and Bethel United Pentecostal Church
The following in bold is what was reported in part by The Mid Valley Times (you will need to subscribe to read the article) on November 11, 2020 regarding the case against Victor Becerra and Ron Bohde’s response.
But the pastor also continued to deny the claims and further wished rain and discomfort on a group of protestors made up of the victims’ family and friends.
“I don’t believe that he did it,” said Bohde. “Just to mess with their minds — I’m just praying that they get rain, cold and soaked wet, and miserably enjoy their protest.”
The comments received laughter and applause from his congregation.
On October 8, 2020, a jury found Victor Becerra, a former licensed United Pentecostal minister, guilty of 19 counts of child molestation of four minor girls at Calvary Apostolic Church in Dinuba, California where Ronald Bohde is the pastor and Becerra was a youth leader. In 2021 he was sentenced to prison for 228 years to life. In an October 14, 2020 article from The Mid Valley Times, (again, you will need to subscribe) it was noted:
“We were finally able to sleep well,” said Veronica Reese, mother of two of the victims, after Becerra was convicted. “It’s so amazing. They (her two daughters) were emotional and crying. But, we finally got justice.”
Reese stated that throughout the allegations, prosecution and trial, members from Calvary Apostolic Church continued to defend Becerra as they accused her and other victims of fabricating the abuse. It was also reported that the church bailed Becerra out of prison after his initial arrest. – October 14, 2020 The Mid Valley Times
After Becerra’s conviction, in an outdoor service, Bohde spoke about being treated wrong and that the protests on the church sidewalks were attempting to “disrupt and harass” them. He mentioned how enemies should be treated and loving those people. Yet it appears he forgot this just a short time later, when he wished ill on the protestors, as reported by The Mid Valley Times.
Survivors should not have to endure a pastor and church mishandling what happened as they have more than enough dealing with their sexual abuse. In my opinion, Ron Bohde is a perfect example of the need for the United Pentecostal Church’s position paper on sexual abuse. Will the UPC add actions to their words and intervene in cases like this? From what we have seen so far, their response has been mostly silence as Bohde continues to hold license with them and pastor one of their churches.
You will find a complete list of articles in this series by clicking here.
I was a member of the United Pentacostal Church in Junction City Kansas in the late 70s to early 80s. Our minister was Brother Westburg. In the time I spent as a member I was a teenager. We were taught not to question what our minister said because everything he said was from God. Even to this day, a part of me wants to believe that there are good people in the church, but I have seen no good. I had friends die or disappear and the church went on as if nothing had happened. When I later in life started asking questions to the families of these people my questions were met with harsh words from everyone. I got no real answers. One of my friends to this day has never been found by FBI. My friend throughout high school, who was a strong swimmer, drown in a local lake but I got no real answers of how it could have happened. There was sexual scandal in the church too. After Brother Westburg died the new minister and his son were sexually abusing children. I had one young girl who was the daughter of a friend of mine from when I went to the church, accuse the minister of raping her on repeated occassions and getting her pregnant. She was hidden away. When she went in labor, she had the baby at home and she said the minister came with a lady and took the baby. She said she tried to tell people but because she had been hidden away for the whole pregnancy, she had no proof of anything. She trusted in me because she knew I was once a member of the church and that I knew her father. I felt bad that I could not help her. I was told by a college professor that I am a natural born writer but to write well you have to write what you know so I am doing research on the United Pentacostal to find how many sexual scandals there have been and just how many have been actually prosecuted and how many the church organization has swept under the rug to protect the church. Can you please contact me so I can maybe draw on your experiences and knowledge of this church. I feel more people need to know what this church is really like so they don’t make a mistake of joining it and being blind to what happens behind closed doors there.
We have written extensively on the Junction City church. Go to http://www.spiritualabuse.org/experiences/lawsuits/edwin_young.html & then there are numerous additional links from there, including the charges against Edwin Young’s son: http://www.spiritualabuse.org/experiences/lawsuits/jordan_young.html
I assume the disappearance you speak of is regarding Beverly Ward and there is an article on this: http://www.spiritualabuse.org/experiences/lawsuits/beverly_ward.html I have also heard about the swimming death. Much abuse happened at this church.
As to how many abuse cases have occurred in the UPCI, no one knows the number as the majority of cases have gone unreported and therefore not prosecuted. Many people do not openly speak of their abuse and so there is no way in which to determine how many cases were swept under the rug. Also, sometimes when cases are reported in the news, they make no mention of it being UPCI related.