KINGSTON, Jamaica — A former pastor, who was brought up on buggery charges back in 2020, is back before the courts on fraud charges.

Thirty-two-year-old Anthony Whyte was remanded into custody until March 22 when he appeared before the Kingston and St Andrew Parish Court on Tuesday to answer to charges of conspiracy to defraud and computer-related fraud.

He is accused of illegally obtaining funds via wire transfers.

Highlighting the pastor’s reported “checkered past”, Senior Parish Judge Lori-Ann Cole Montague said Whyte’s previous run-ins with the law would not assist him in his current situation. Expressing her disappointment in someone she outlined was raised on good Christian principles, Montague said Whyte is constantly finding himself on the wrong side of the law.

“You are 32 years old, a fairly young man but you have quite the checkered past. You are before the court again for sentencing, this time for fraud, and I am not under the impression that you are being forthright about what you have done,” she said. “It is disappointing because you were exposed to good Christian principles. You started on your quest as a Minister of Religion so for you to have done what you did it’s really bad.”

Setting another date for the matter to be heard once more, Montague ordered that the defendant be remanded until all evidence has been properly filed.

Whyte has another matter before the St Ann Circuit Court. It is alleged that in 2020, the ex-pastor sexually molested a 12-year-old boy who was reportedly a member of his Seventh-Day Adventist Church.

Whyte, who reportedly fled the island two years following the allegations, was deported back to Jamaica to face trial. This, after the Fourth Circuit in the United States, where he fled, threw out his asylum petition.