A SECURITY worker for a preacher who calls himself The Prophet has told a jury she sometimes had to "body check" members of the congregation who tried to get too near him.
Amy Asante, 36, told the trial of Walter Masocha, who is accused of sex offences, that as Archbishop of the Stirling-based Agape For All Nations Church, he had a security team of seven.
Dr Asante, who holds a PhD in law, was based at Masocha's home, Coseyneuk House, near Stirling, where the 51 year old religious leader, lived.
He is also called The Prophet, The Apostle, and The Man of God by his followers, and his wife Judith is the deputy head of the church. She is titled The Prophetess.
Dr Asante told Falkirk Sheriff Court yesterday (fri) that members of the Agape security team were known as "EEs". She when she joined the security team in 2011 she went on a security course "run by the company that trains people for G4S".
She said she received a certificate like that obtained by a nightclub door steward.
She said: "My job is to stay with The Apostle and The Prophetess, or Dr Masocha and his wife, accompany them everywhere, and make sure the venues are secure."
She said she had never seen Masocha, who is accused of sexually assaulting a deaconess and engaging in sexual activity with an underage female church member, behave in an inappropriate way towards any member of his congregation. The incidents are said to have occurred between April 2012 and January 2014. Masocha denies both charges.
Dr Asante said some church members could be "pests", even during services, and she sometimes had to put her arm out to keep them away from Masocha.
She said: "They'd run around shaking their arms and legs.
"There were many times I had to body check them, and where I'd think that's perhaps not a nice environment I'm creating -- I'd have to remember it's a church."
She said another part of her job was to make sure that people did not take up too much of Dr Masocha's time in one-to-one meetings with him, known as "surgeries".
She said: "Walter Masocha is very busy, he has work to do, he has paperwork to do, and that's why there is rather a large staff."
Judith Masocha, 49, a former insurance worker, said in answer to questioning that she herself received a salary of POUNDS 32,000 a year from the church, which is funded by members' contributions. The court heard earlier that Masocha himself took home up to POUNDS 40,000 a year, net.
Alison Montgomery, prosecuting, asked: "How did you get the title Prophetess?"
Mrs Masocha, who like her husband comes from Zimbabwe, replied: "If you are the wife of a Prophet you are known as a Prophetess."
She added: "Someone had to come from America, and they conferred the title on my life."
Mrs Masocha told John Scullion, QC, defending that she had never noticed "anything untoward" in her husband's behaviour towards the teenage girl who earlier in the trial alleged he had slid his hand down her trousers, "pinged" her knickers, and claimed he was doing so to clear away demons.
Mrs Masocha was asked about evidence given by the deaconess, a 32 year old mother of four, who said at one point that she had looked on embarrassed as Masocha kissed her neck.
Mrs Masocha said the incident had never occurred.
She said: "I am his wife, I'd be the first one to say 'what's up?'
"I would have been the one to go between them and pull them apart."
The defence has now closed.
The trial before Sheriff Kenneth McGowan continues with summing up expected by the prosecution and defence on Monday.
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