After nearly a year of dueling filings and a failed effort to recover more than $76,000 in legal fees, Bishop T.D. Jakes has voluntarily dismissed a defamation lawsuit against ex-pastor-turned-registered sex offender Duane Youngblood, who accused Jakes of sexually assaulting him 40 years ago.
“Pursuant to Rule 41(a)(1)(a)(ii), Plaintiff Thomas Dexter Jakes hereby gives notice that the above-captioned action is voluntarily dismissed by consent of all parties who have appeared in this action,” the brief notice of dismissal filed by both attorneys for Jakes and Youngblood in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Pennsylvania last Thursday.
Jakes, 68, who founded The Potter’s House megachurch in Dallas, Texas, filed the defamation lawsuit against 59-year-old Youngblood on Nov. 25, 2024, a day after he suffered what was later revealed to be a heart attack while preaching.
Youngblood claimed in interviews with internet personality Larry Reid on his “Larry Reid Live” show on Oct. 28 and Nov. 3, 2024, that Jakes assaulted him when he was about 18 or 19 years old.
Jakes has denied the allegations. Youngblood claimed to Reid that he had been talking with Jakes for about two hours at the home of an older adult clergywoman, where he was staying during a local church revival approximately 40 years ago, when Jakes tried to kiss him.
“After sitting there and having this long discourse with him, I finally looked at my watch, and I’m like, ‘Oh my goodness, I got to go. I got to get this car back to my mother. She’s gonna kill me.’ So I said to bishop, ‘I got to get up,'” Youngblood recalled.
“And I got up from the table, he got up from the table, he walked around toward the way I had to exit quicker than I got over there, and when I started to walk past him, he pulled me to himself, wrapped his arms around me, and tried to kiss me. And in that moment, I literally died.”
The morning after the encounter, Youngblood alleges Jakes called his home and intimated that he wanted him to become a local sex partner.
Youngblood’s older brother, Pastor Richard Edwin Youngblood, also accused Jakes of attempting to sexually assault him years ago while he shared a hotel room with the bishop during a ministry trip.
“He secured a room with two beds in it, and we went to the room for the night. That night, while I was lying in my bed, I felt Elder Jakes climb into my bed. He pressed his body against mine and asked, ‘Youngblood, do you feel that?’ He was referencing his erection that he was pressing against my backside,” Richard Youngblood wrote in his affidavit.
“I got up out of bed in complete shock as he also [got] up from the opposite side and met me. He grabbed me by my arms and pulled me to him and started trying to kiss me. At this point, I cannot believe what is happening to me.”
Other men also made sworn affidavits in support of Duane Youngblood’s claims, including Jeffrey S. Gray, who also shared Duane Youngblood’s disclosures about Jakes; Daniel B. Spaulding, LaShawn Youngblood, Joshua Munoz and Landon Claybourne.
In August, Duane Youngblood’s former attorney on the case, Tyrone Blackburn, was sanctioned for submitting fabricated quotations and misleading analysis of case law due to his reliance on artificial intelligence. He also claimed to represent the convicted ex-husband of Jakes’ eldest daughter, Cora Jakes, and other unnamed males who he claims have made credible allegations against the Potter’s House founder of grooming, sexual assault, sexting and transporting them across state lines.
Read the complete article at ChristianPost.com
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