New York State Police said when they were first called, family members falsely told them Lucas had been shot.
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The Word of Life is not a “mainline” church, and members have had little interaction with neightbors, said the Rev. Abraham Esper of St. Patrick’s-St. Police learned of the assaults after interviewing church members.
“During the counseling session involving Lucas Leonard and his brother Christopher, the session turned physical”.
Then the counseling turned violent.
For several hours, punches and kicks landed all over the teenagers’ bodies, he said – on their abdomens, genitals, backs and thighs. Leonard’s injuries were consistent with blunt force trauma to his torso and extremities, police said. But Christopher was hidden somewhere on the second floor of the Word of Life Church in New Hartford.
The teenager’s death was first reported after church members took him to a local hospital on Monday.
“He wasn’t in hiding, but he wasn’t making himself available, and the family members were not telling us where he was”, Inserra explained.
Bruce and Deborah Leonard have been charged with first-degree manslaughter.
What they found inside the three-story church led them to arrest on manslaughter charges Bruce Leonard, 65, and Deborah Leonard, 59, Leonard’s mother and father, and four other parishioners on assault charges, including the victim’s sister.
District Attorney said there was not enough evidence to charge the couple with murder.
“We are not alleging that they meant to kill their son”. The assault that preceded his death began Sunday evening and continued until Monday morning.
A telephone number or contact for the church could not be located online.
Police said the Word of Life Church is used as both a church and a residence. “This did not do that”.
Garramone and police say they aren’t certain why the boys were being punished. Still, she added, “I think they’re good people that made a bad decision”.
All six suspects, among them David Morey, 26, of Utica, and Linda Morey, 54, of Utica, and Joseph Irwin, 26, who lives in the church building, have pleaded not guilty and were sent to Oneida County Jail. Irwin, a member of the Word of Life Church has been charged with assault for beating 19-year-old Lucas Leonard inside the church.
The building was once the Chadwicks Union Free School.
The church is a former elementary school where a Christian congregation has worshiped for as many as 30 years. Police said that four of the children belonged to Ferguson.
Over time, there was friction between the church and a neighboring community, she said. In one photo, Deborah and Bruce Leonard beam at the camera during a wedding anniversary outing. CNN reported. He had heard “very loud and very disruptive” noises coming from the church a few afternoons and nights, including the beating of drums and barking dogs. Family members did not say where he was. Law enforcement officials determined the Word of Life Church was the scene of the crime, according to the Associated Press. The boy was in a diaper and a shirt.
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Nicole Howard said the two siblings weren’t permitted to have sleepovers. When local resident Sarah Gendron went to a service about eight years ago, she left with an impression of a congregation that liked services full of music, a few played on electric guitars and drums, and went door to door dropping off bread, milk and butter. But overall, the church was a quiet presence, he said.
