A former assistant pastor who misappropriated $200,000 from a local church during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic was sentenced Friday to two years in state prison, the Ventura County District Attorney’s Office announced.
Curtis Frank Lemons, who previously lived in Camarillo and now resides in Atoka, Tennessee, pleaded guilty in April to three felony counts — two of grand theft and one of money laundering. The charges stem from his actions while serving as an assistant pastor at New Progressive Christian Baptist Church in Oxnard in late 2020.
Prosecutors said Lemons issued himself a $200,000 cashier’s check from the church’s bank account in December 2020, as the church’s longtime patriarch was gravely ill and the congregation was grappling with the early uncertainties of the pandemic…