'Bags and bags' of money found stashed in bathroom wall at Joel Osteen's megachurch: report

I think Joel did it himself.

Why would someone not just walk out with it or go back and smuggle it out?

Perhaps they forgot about it r2.

He has red hair now?

He is one ugly motherfucker.

Money laundering.

Yeah this was shady for sure. No one forgets to pick up over half a million in cash. Wonder if he made an insurance claim for other items and wanted to make it look more believable by showing 600k was gone too. Tax these religious freaks already.

He did file an insurance claim if I remember correctly.

We're assuming that this was an elaborate way to launder that $600K, correct? If so, what could someone have even done with the dirty money they hid in the walls? Would it have eventually been safe to spend, years later?

And yet he counts thousands of compete idiots in his flock.

Thieves' rob themselves. Who knew.

Suspicious.

The money was found next to Joel's glory hole stall.

I saw a Law And Order in which bank robbery money stashed in the walls for 30 years or whatever was immediately flagged when someone used it to pay for goods at a hardware store for being so damn old. Apparently most American paper money is only in circulation for under 5 years.

PRAISE!!! And you pagan motherfuckers claim miracles don't happen...Just in time for XMAS!!!!

XMAS, R14?? XXXXMMMMAAAASSS????!!!??! You forgot Christ!!!!! It's ChRiStMaS!!!!!!!

I'm super honest buy if I was that plumber I'd have taken that cash. Osteen is a crook so I have no qualms about stealing it back.

I like how the plumber called in to a radio show to spill the beans, I guess this wasn't reported anywhere until he did. Someone was trying to keep it quiet!

He was just saving up cash in case any of his favorite acolytes needed to go to the Abortion Hut at the mall. You wouldn't want that on your credit card. Just think of the bad publicity.

I don’t understand a claim of money laundering, sounds more just like run of the mill theft.

What’s the purpose for money laundering in a tax-exempt organization, the primary income source of which is anonymous people putting cash into large collection plates?

Very timely, as Joel's two-year-old Bentley is about due to be replaced.

Had to be Joel himself. No one is going to steal money and leave it. He stashed it.

Joel doesn’t seem like the handy-type necessary to open up a wall.

$600K is chump change to Joel.

Hookers and blow!

Shit, they didn't find the bag with the poppers and lube did they?

Warrants and heroin.

Maybe, the beginning of his downfall?

[quote]XXXXMMMMAAAASSS????!!!??! You forgot Christ!!!!! It's ChRiStMaS!!!!!!!

Joel Osteen? I don't know her.

I can't stand this guy, Joel Osteen. He is an obvious grifter. Who the hell looks at his face and says, "Yeah, I want to hear what this guy has to say."

I would love to see him taken down by a scandal, preferably one that involves shame and jail time.

I'm not saying that this discovery will lead to that, it's just a fantasy of mine.

He is disgusting.

So seven years ago someone who stole 600K and at some point since passed himself off as a contractor, went in and installed a wall in the bathroom and no one noticed that drywall guy hadn't been called by the church? This is confusing.

Joel is praying for us.

My spidey sense says that JOEL HIMSELF is the culprit!

--- Dora Dumbfuck, websleuth and podcaster extraordinaire

I was going to say that it's dodgy having that much cash around anyway, but it was probably just the proceeds of one Sundays' collection bowl pass around

He probably wanted to make sure he had an oh shit the jig is up fund.

That doesn't sound like something I would do.

Prince said it best.

[quote]I don’t understand a claim of money laundering

People are speculating that Osteen had $600K in dirty money in his safe, and to launder it, he hid the cash and falsely claimed it was stolen, getting reimbursed $600K from his insurance company in what would be clean, spendable money.

That's why I asked if there ever would be a time when that $600K would be spendable, in this possible scenario. It seems to me that if this laundering theory was correct, that once you replaced that $600K, the safest thing would be to burn the dirty money. Hiding it makes me wonder what's going on, because why steal $600K from a safe and then spend all that time hiding it in hundreds of envelopes in the same building?

R38, I still don’t understand. If Osteen had $600,000 in dirty money, from who knows what but that’s another topic, why wouldn’t he just put it in the collection plate? It’s a church so it wouldn’t be taxed. He could have the church spend it on anything he wanted for his private use and not have to pay income tax either. His church is the perfect vehicle for laundering money and none of these other hoops would have to be jumped through.

How much was in cash and how much was in checks?

How very 'Ozark' of him.

damn...that was Joel's retirement money.....

I'd like to see him go down too. Isn't he the one that kept the doors locked when a hurricane devastated everything around them?

It was probably not Osteen who took/hid the money; it was likely someone who worked for him, high enough in the organization to know how to steal it, where to hide it, and with a plan to eventually recover it. Osteen's grift is so large that a mere half-million-and-change doesn't warrant the effort. The exposure to insurance fraud alone is enough to quickly rule Osteen out (and if there was a payout, the insurance company is going to be entitled to priority position for recovery).

The question no one's asking is why whoever stashed it in the bathroom wall knew to do it there vs. some other such location, like say in the walls between offices or meeting rooms (although as a restroom, far more people would have access to it than almost any other location in the building). The optimal such location would be an exterior wall; it's not like these palaces of grift are built of masonry, especially not in Texas, and then the thief wouldn't need to have interior access to the hiding spot. This was done by someone who knew they were going to have access to the location for the long term, and God knows these men spend long stretches of time in the toilets.

Jesus wants me to launder money

Stop making fun of me! I will pray for your souls, homosexual sinners!

$600,000 is not a lot of money for Osteen. I think it's the money from the safe. Seems odd to move the money from the safe to the inside of a wall.

Osteen does not seem straight / hetero to me.

That's the money I set aside for poppers, bondage gear, and rent boys

R16 - the plumber only pulled out a bag or two that had primarily envelopes with checks. Once the Houston PD was called, they opened up the wall and found the rest 400k in checks, the rest in cash. He was questioned by the police and had to stick around for seven hours. They probably searched him and the service vehicle. And he got no thanks for his trouble, of course.

[Quote]Justin said the church or HPD never thanked him or reached out to him about $25,000 reward money," the station reported, referring to the reward that was offered following the 2014 theft. "Justin said he even called Crime Stoppers about reward money, but never heard back. He even tried reaching out to Joel Osteen but hasn’t heard back."

Agreed that this doesn't seem like enough money for Osteen to risk insurance fraud charges for, and I suspect he's a lot better at money, er, "management" than simply putting money in a wall a la Walt's laundry room in Breaking Bad.

Who would have had access to a wall like that long enough that they could have put hundreds of envelopes in there without anyone noticing?

And what happened to them to prevent them from coming back?

[quote]And what happened to them to prevent them from coming back?

That, R49, is the $64,000 question. I suspect foul play. Sic 'em, datalounge sleuths!

Now onto the important, does his son have a phat ass??

Someone high up in the organization stashed the money and then lost access to the building. Probably Osteen figured out who took the money early on, let him go and then filed the insurance claim. It's a lot easier recouping the money from insurance than turning the culprit over to the police and dealing with the fallout. I imagine a number of church officials knew who took the money and have kept quiet. I'm sure they preferred not to deal with a scandal of embezzlement or a media spotlight on how much money they actually rake in.

That makes sense, R52 - whoever hid the money got fired / lost access to the building. Hence, was not able to take the money home.

Also, if $400,000 is in checks, the church can't really cash them anymore. I am sure Lakewood didn't want the discovery to become public because now that the insurance company knows, they can move to reclaim their payout (or whatever it's called). This is going to end up costing Lakewood a lot of money-- GOOD.

Osteen and his entire family and his hangers on are all Grade A, 100 sleaze bags, just like all other pseudo-religious assholes.

I imagine they launder money for drug cartels. Probably a lot of these megachurches do. It makes more sense than him trying to hide his takings.

Yep. Good Christians at work.

R57, God wants us to be rich!

No, R58, God wants *Joel* to be rich.

It was money and checks

I guarantee you that once the bag of money and checks were found, that scumbag osteen had his secretary make a copy of all the checks that were recovered and the church has contacted the people who wrote those checks to re-issue new ones. So they can 'get right with jesus"

It was an older person helping themselves and then they died before they could go back and get the money. Someone who had a grudge against Joel because they took the checks too.

The deacon did it! (before his sudden"disappearance").

WHET Deacon Lightfoot?

Someone had bad intentions for sure.

It was probably his wife.

We need Hercule Poirot on the case

That was an episode of Ozark

It’s how he pays for all the hair gel.

His church is the old Compaq Center where the Houston Rockets used to play. So an interior wall might have been the only option . My guess would be that ministry launders a lot of money . He came from out of nowhere about 20 years ago and has begun a religious juggernaut. That doesn’t happen from donations alone .

Nobody cares that Joel looks like he's smelling cookies all the time.

Well since all that money was just sitting around in a wall doing nothing. Now we're on the cusp of a major Christian holiday and with the pandemic and all no doubt there are a lot of "needy" folks. It's obvious what would be the Christian thing to do with all that the money right? 💰 💰 💰 💰 💰

Sure Jan. He’s a prosperity gospel nut. If you’re poor, it’s because you’re not right with God.

He should've watched Ozark to learn how to launder money.

Speaking of laundering money, you guys know that Kris Jenner owns a church, too, right?

R68 but didn't Daddy Osteen start the church and Joel just kind of took over?

Did I hear, er read my name?

The way he's always looking up as if he sees an ethereal specter is hair-raising.. Even if I thought I needed to be preached to, it wouldn't be by him.

Yes he’s the religious equivalent of a used car salesman.

[quote]R68] but didn't Daddy Osteen start the church and Joel just kind of took over?

Yes, he did. The story I read (in a Vanity Far profile, maybe?) is that he didn't want to take it on, but was persuaded by his wife.

"'Bags and bags' of money found stashed in bathroom wall..."

Studio 54 all over again.

Ouch!

He's a hottie, R80.