According to the Washington Post, A D.C. Superior Court judge has reinstated the son of the late Apostle Betty P. Peebles to the board of the Jericho City of Praise. The decision is likely to touch off a new battle over control of one of the Washington area’s largest and best-known houses of worship.
Judge Stuart G. Nash ruled that Joel R. Peebles and William A. Meadows were improperly removed from the board of trustees in 2009 and that subsequent actions taken by the board, including firing Peebles as pastor after his mother’s death, were invalid.
The church — which Betty Peebles and her husband, the late Bishop James R. Peebles Sr., founded in Northeast Washington more than five decades ago — has grown into a 100-acre campus near FedEx field in Landover, Md., complete with senior-citizen housing, a business park, a school and a drug treatment center.
Order Finding of Facts and Conclusion of Law entered on docket, signed by Judge Nash and e-filed, e-served on parties of record on 7/7/15
Judgment is GRANTED in favor of the plaintiffs, to wit: the Court hereby DECLARES that Resolution 1-09 of the Jericho DC Board of Trustees, which purported to change the membership of the Board of Trustees, is invalid; and DECLARES that the current Board of Trustees for Jericho DC shall consist of the surviving members of the Board of Trustees that existed prior to the invalidated Resolution 1-09, those members being: William A. Meadows; Dorothy L. Williams, and Joel R. Peebles and DECLARES that actions taken by defendants after March 15, 2009, acting as the purported Board of Trustees of Jericho DC, under the color of resolution 1-09, including the purported approval of the merger of Jericho DC into Jericho MD, are invalid; and the Court hereby ORDERS THAT DEFENDANTS REFRAIN FROM EXERCISING OWNERSHIP OR CONTROL OVER ANY CORPORATE ASSETS OF JERICHO MARYLAND FORMERLY BELONGING TO, OR DERIVED FROM, THE CORPORATED ASSETS OF JERICHO DC, and ORDERS that plaintiffs are reinstated as members of the church pending a review of their membership status by the validly-constituted Board of Trustees of Jericho DC.
