With his prison term behind him Rev. Henry J. Lyons returns to the pulpit promising to work for forgiveness from former followers.
By WILLIAM R. LEVESQUE
Published December 1, 2003
[Times photos: Willie Allen Jr.]
Rev. Henry J. Lyons stands before a packed First Baptist Institutional Church in Lakeland and proclaims "I have suffered God's rod of correction." Lyons was found guilty in 1999 of grand theft and racketeering and released from prison Sunday.
Rev. Henry J. Lyons is fitted with a new robe during a rededication ceremony at First Baptist Institutional Church in Lakeland. Lyons was welcomed back to the ministry and said he wants to be a pastor in St. Petersburg.
Dozens of members from Rev. Henry J. Lyons' old congregation at Bethel Metropolitan Baptist Church traveled to Lakeland to support Lyons. Anna Killen-Boswell gave her former pastor a standing ovation.
Twenty-three ministers lay hands on Rev. Henry J. Lyons during a prayer of restoration. Lyons was invited to the Lakeland church by its pastor and his old friend, Rev. Alex Harper Sr., who picked him up at work release Sunday.
For a comprehensive look at the Rev. Henry Lyons saga, click here.
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LAKELAND - The Rev. Henry J. Lyons stood before another pastor's congregation Sunday wearing an old clerical robe. Twenty-three ministers pulled the robe off and laid hands on him.
A minister called out a five-minute prayer of restoration. Then the pastors parted, handing Lyons a new garment. Cheers erupted, and cries of "Amen!" floated through the church.
"I have suffered God's rod of correction," Lyons told the packed First Baptist Institutional Church after climbing to the pulpit. "I stand here today to tell you I have truly, truly repented of my sins."
With those words, the former national Baptist leader was welcomed back to the ministry after four years and eight months in prison.
Lyons, 61, a convicted racketeer who stole millions as president of the National Baptist Convention USA Inc., walked out of the Bartow Work Release Center in Polk County a little past 6 a.m. wearing a dark suit and tie.
As he left, the St. Petersburg minister said, he took a deep breath, looked skyward and thanked God. A friend picked him up.
Without a church or a congregation to follow him, Lyons embarks on a new life as an ex-convict with the eyes of thousands of former followers upon him. He said he intends to prove he is again worthy of trust and respect.
Lyons said God has forgiven him but he must work for forgiveness from those who once worshiped with him. He said he wants to be a pastor in St. Petersburg, where he will live with friends for the next several weeks or months. He hopes his old congregation at Bethel Metropolitan Baptist Church will invite him back to lead them.
If not, Lyons said he might investigate other job possibilities, including some outside Florida.
"Some serious healing has to take place," Lyons told reporters after the service. "It will take some time...I am serious about my repentence. I'm not playing games...I did a lot of wrong. It takes time."
He said he would again become involved with the Baptist convention but will not seek to become its leader again.
The ministers and parishioners who watched Lyons on Sunday were in a forgiving mood. They said it is God's way to give second chances.
"We're Christians," said the Rev. Terry Taylor of Pompano Beach. "Forgiveness should come automatic. We should always be ready for reconciliation."
Willie Thomas, one of dozens of members of Bethel's congregation who traveled to Lakeland to see Lyons, said a majority of the church's parishioners want him to return. The church does not currently have a permanent pastor, he said.
"We want him back with all our hearts and soul," Thomas said. "We're hoping he sends a resume."
It was a July 1997 fire set by Lyons' wife that triggered the scandal. The blaze at the $700,000 Tierra Verde home Lyons bought with another woman touched off an investigation that shattered his Baptist presidency and eventually led to state grand theft and racketeering charges.
On Feb. 27, 1999, a Pinellas-Pasco jury convicted Lyons of those charges and concluded he swindled millions from the convention's corporate partners. He also was convicted of pocketing money from the Anti-Defamation League that had been earmarked for rebuilding burned black churches.
A month later, a judge sentenced Lyons to 51/2 years in prison. He received time off for good behavior and work while imprisoned.
Lyons later pleaded guilty to federal fraud and tax evasion charges that didn't add any jail time. Now he is on federal probation for at least three years.
At times Sunday, Lyons' re-entry into society looked carefully choreographed. A volunteer press aide organized media inquiries. A pew in the church was set aside for reporters. Lyons' first scheduled stop after a private breakfast with ministers was a news conference in a Lakeland hotel.
In contrast to the slight and dispirited man at his March 1999 state sentencing, Lyons looked energetic and cheerful. He quipped to a half-dozen reporters that the news conference was a happier event than antagonistic media gatherings during the scandal that sent him to prison.
"It's like it used to be, before '97," he said, smiling.
Then he climbed into the passenger seat of an older Mercedes 300 SE for the short drive to church.
Lyons was invited to the Lakeland church by its pastor, the Rev. Alex Harper Sr., who picked Lyons up at work release. A friend for 30 years, Harper called Lyons a "genius" who makes "the devil and his demons shake in their boots."
Lyons, looking thinner and his hair a touch grayer than before his incarceration, displayed his brand of charismatic oration that helped win him convention leadership and a devoted following.
In a sermon about the fall of Job, a wealthy man who lost his riches and endured great suffering but did not lose his faith in God, Lyons said that God gave him the patience and hope to serve his time.
He recalled his first days in prison, "wearing all the state's jewelry," sent to solitary confinement in a 5-by-7-foot cell. He said its walls and ceilings seemed to close in on him until he felt he was about to lose his mind.
"I couldn't go no where," Lyons said. "I was 57 years old. I never been arrested in my life...I couldn't go."
Lyons said that is when he felt the touch of Jesus, who told him, "You have to do this time. But he said I will be with you...So settle down."
Unlike the defiant minister who in 1999 steadfastly denied criminal wrongdoing, Lyons accepted guilt and said he was under no illusion about his sins.
"They didn't make no mistake," Lyons said. "I needed to go someplace and sit down."
He frequently joked with the crowd, appearing almost playful. Lyons pointed out that the major in charge of his work camp was in the church, and said he knew he would be upset that Lyons mentioned him.
"Do anything you want to do," Lyons said as the major stood to cheers. "Just don't lock me up again."
As his sermon reached a rhythmic crescendo, Lyons cried out, "I am alive and standing! I'm standing! I'm standing! I can still feel pain! But I'm standing! It's been a long four years and eight months!"
He almost collapsed into a chair, wiping his brow as up to 300 people gave him a standing ovation and a chorus of "amen" and "hallelujahs."
Lyons, who said he earned $2,066 working at a funeral home and at the First Baptist church as an $8-an-hour janitor and clerk in work release, put $500 of his earnings in the collection basket.
Two of Lyons' four grown children were in the church audience, daughters Stephanie and Treva. Lyons' ex-wife, Deborah Lyons, whom he divorced while imprisoned, did not attend.
Lyons lingered after the service. The faithful took photos. Some asked for autographs. Lyons, a man who sometimes refused reporters' questions in days of scandal, looked to cameras and media nearby and answered all inquiries.
"Got what you need?" he politely asked one reporter before ministers led him to a luncheon.
Lyons said he would work with youth to teach them the lessons he learned in prison.
"I want them to know," he said, "crime does not pay."
The Lyons saga
JULY '97: The Rev. Henry J. Lyons' wife, Deborah, sets fire to a $700,000 house in Tierra Verde and tells investigators she is convinced Lyons is having an affair with Bernice Edwards, who co-owns the waterfront home with Lyons. Within days Pinellas-Pasco State Attorney Bernie McCabe's office is investigating Lyons' financial dealings as president of the National Baptist Convention USA Inc.
AUGUST '97: U.S. Attorney Charles Wilson announces that his Tampa office is launching an investigation of the Baptist leader.
OCTOBER '97: Deborah Lyons pleads guilty to arson of the Tierra Verde house, saying she had been "drinking and under stress at the time." She is sentenced to five years' probation.
FEBRUARY '98: Pinellas-Pasco prosecutors charge Lyons with racketeering and grand theft, alleging that he used fraud and extortion to steal millions of dollars. They also charge Bernice Edwards with racketeering.
JULY '98: Lyons, Edwards and Brenda Harris, an NBC official, are charged in a 61-count federal indictment on charges ranging from tax evasion to money laundering to bank fraud.
FEBRUARY '99: Lyons is found guilty of grand theft and racketeering. Edwards is acquitted of racketeering. Pinellas-Pasco Circuit Judge Susan Schaeffer sentences Lyons a month later to 51/2-years in prison.
JULY 2000: A mortgage lender forecloses on the $700,000 Tierra Verde house that led to Lyons' downfall.
DECEMBER 2000: Lyons is ousted as pastor of Bethel Metropolitan Baptist Church in 200-49 vote by the St. Petersburg church's members. He headed the congregation for more than 25 years.
MARCH 2001: Lyons files for divorce. He claimed to have no assets but $7.8-million in debt, including a lien and restitution payments.
MAY 2003: Bernice Vernell Edwards, 46, whose relationship with Lyons ended while both were in prison, died in federal custody in Illinois. She was serving a nine-month prison sentence for violating her federal probation, and suffered from a chronic pulmonary condition.
NOVEMBER 2003: Lyons is released from prison and plans to live in St. Petersburg.
Key players update
Deborah Lyons
Deborah Lyons was sentenced to five years of probation in October 1997 after pleading guilty to arson. Earlier that year, she set fire to a $700,000 Tierra Verde home after she discovered her husband had purchased it with another woman, Bernice Edwards.
She was granted an early end to her probation in 2000.
Mrs. Lyons, 55, now lives in Largo and was last reported managing WorkNet Pinellas' One-Stop Career Center in St. Petersburg.
Bernice Edwards
Bernice Edwards pleaded guilty in federal court in 1999 to two counts of tax evasion for failing to report more than $500,000 in income from the National Baptist Convention USA from 1995 and 1996. Prosecutors agreed to drop 23 other charges against her. She was sentenced to 21 months in prison.
Edwards, 46, served 13 months in a federal prison in Indiana before moving to a halfway house in Akron, Ohio. She spent five months there and started working at a job-training program.
In 2002, she was sent back to prison after a judge ruled she violated the terms of her probation. She suffered from a chronic pulmonary condition and died in federal custody in Illinois in May.
Brenda Harris
Brenda Harris, a meeting planner for the National Baptist Convention USA, admitted having an affair with Lyons. She received 18 months of probation in 1999 after pleading guilty to a federal charge that she failed to report the commission of a crime.
Prosecutors said Harris, 52, failed to report to a bank that her down payment for a $340,000 home in Tennessee came from a slush fund controlled by Lyons. She lives in Tennessee.
