US televangelist Jim Bakker, ensnared in fraud and sex scandal, dies at 86

The US televangelist Jim Bakker, who built a multimillion-dollar empire and lived ⁠in opulence before being disgraced by a sex scandal, a conviction for defrauding followers and divorce from his television co-host Tammy Faye, has died aged 86.

The death of Bakker, whose journey from the TV pulpit to a prison cell in the 1980s inspired comparisons to the corrupt character of the fictional preacher-huckster Elmer Gantry, was revealed on ⁠social media by his second wife, Lori ⁠Bakker. “It is with a broken heart that ​I share that my beloved husband, Jim Bakker, went home to be with the Lord this evening,” she wrote on the Facebook and Instagram pages of her husband’s latest television ministry. Read More....