This article is part of “shepherds and prisoners”, a series that investigates the accusations of sexual abuse in the assemblies of God.
Houston – Daniel Savala bows back in a fabric armchair, raises his right hand and swears before God that what is about to say is the truth.
Looking at the camera, the Pentecostal missionary speaks with slow sentences and measures, describing how, for decades, he won the confidence of university students who reached their bungalow covered with ivy in search of spiritual guidance. Using the Scriptures, he convinced them that they could open on uncomfortable issues such as pornography and masturbation. Then he would hit, touching his penises and pressing them to touch his, all under the appearance of bringing them to Jesus.
“I knew I was wrong,” says Savala in the video, filmed by a lawyer in 2023. “But I did it anyway.”
Religion, he says, was the tool of his deception. “People can see that spiritual part of your life without seeing all who you are.”
And the person who really was?
“Manipulator,” he says naturally. “Cunning.” “Sinister.”
In the two years since Savala registered that confession in his home in Houston, lawyers, activists and complainants have worked to unravel how a sexual criminal sentenced with an eighth grade education managed to convince the scores of shepherds and young Christians to put their faith in him, and why the church officials repeatedly did not stop him.
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In police reports, demands, online forums and interviews with NBC News, dozens of children and young people have described how Savala turned their own twisted version of the Gospel. He taught them that being naked in his backyard sauna was essential to become true brothers in Christ, or, as he expressed, “nudity is unity.” For those who fight with lustful temptation, he offered a contradictory solution: group masturbation, sometimes while listening to Christian worship music. He pushed more of his more disciples; In demands, signed statements and criminal presentations, at least 10 have accused him of sexually abusing them.
“He would say things like: ‘Hey, you know it’s well to masturbate,” said Joseph Cleveland, who says Savala prepared him and abused him sexually for a decade since 2004, when he was 15 years old. “Because we are brothers, we can do it together.”

The shepherds who walked hundreds of high school and university students to Savala’s house were part of Chi Alpha, a Christian ministry that evangelizes on university campuses. Students are looking for Chi Alpha to connect with God and among them, through small biblical studies and relief adoration services, and, for more than 30 years, through Savala. Generations of Chi Alpha leaders acclaimed him as a spiritual sage who could respond to the deepest mysteries of life.
The children and the young people who dedicated themselves to Savala called him “Papa Daniel”, “The vagabund of God” and “The most sacred man alive.” In their direction, student teams built the backyard sauna that became the site of their alleged crimes. Then, wrapped in their teachings, their followers often did not see themselves as victims until years or decades later. At least one of the university students that Savala exploded sexually became a shepherd and brought his own children to learn from his teacher within his dark sauna.
The reward for the devotion of that minister: as Savala, now faces the possibility of life in prison.
The Ministry of Savala collapsed at the beginning of 2023, when several men presented themselves, some anonymous, to accuse him and some of his protected abuse and sexual exploitation, which caused a wave of criminal charges, demands and layoffs of pastor. Savala was arrested, and at least six Chi Alpha shepherds, leaders and students who studied under it were accused of sexual abuse.

The revelations shook Chi Alpha and the Pentecostal denomination that directs it, the assemblies of God, who have almost 3 million members to 13,000 churches in the United States, such as Savala, 69, wait for the trial in Waco, Texas, the assemblies of the leaders of God have sought themselves to Minister Leico, repeatedly affirming that Savala was not used by Chi Alpha and accredited to those who Saval has not been used by Chi Alpha and has never been accredited at a precalte to the proceeding. denomination.
But an NBC news investigation, based on interviews and a review of emails, judicial records, photographs and publications on social networks, shows that Savala was deeply rooted in Chi Alpha, and some leaders accredited him by the rapid growth of the ministry in recent decades. The reports reveal that the leaders of the Assemblies of God, to the National Superintendent of the denomination, were repeatedly warned about the worrying story of Savala, but did not cut their influence. These failures allowed more children and young people to show, as the report shows.
It was not the first time that the officials of the Assemblies of God, the largest Pentecostal denomination in the world, were accused of poorly handling the mismanagement of accusations of sexual abuse. In May, a NBC news investigation revealed how the church leaders dismissed the repeated accusations of abuse against a charismatic children’s pastor called Joe Campbell in the 1980s, which allowed him to remain in the Ministry for years as more more supposed victims were presented.
Do you have a story to share about the assemblies of God’s management of accusations of sexual abuse? Email reporter Mike Hixenbaugh.
Chi Alpha had a clear opportunity to break the ties with Savala in 2012, when the authorities in Alaska accused him of sexually abusing children as a youth minister in the 1990 of letters to request indulgence to indulgence. After a period in jail, Savala returned to organize Chi Alpha students at his home in Houston.

In the decade that followed, at least half a dozen people contacted the officials of the Assemblies of God in Texas and at the national headquarters of the denomination in Springfield, Missouri, warning them that Chi Alpha was exposing students to a sexual offender. These complainants wrote emails, made telephone calls and spoke in internal meetings. Again and again, they were fired or ignored, found NBC News.
“The concealment is the ally of abuse,” said Anthony Scoma, a pastor who resigned from a leadership position of God’s assemblies in Texas after he said that the senior denomination officials could not act in their warnings about Savala in 2023 Shine the light in our dark places. “
Instead of considering how church leaders welcomed a sexual offender in the fold, Savala accusers say that God’s assemblies have taken a defensive position, refusing to publish an internal investigation and trust the non -dissemination agreements to prevent history from spreading.
Critics, including several current and previous shepherds of the Assemblies of God, say that this response exposes a culture of church leadership that is more concerned with avoiding legal responsibility than protecting the vulnerable. They are asking the Assemblies of God to commission an independent review of their management of accusations of sexual abuse throughout the country to ensure that nothing like this happens again.
‘Pastors and Dams’: NBC News investigates sexual abuse in the churches of the Assemblies of God
In a statement to NBC News, the Assemblies of God said that he ordered the leaders of Chi Alpha to remain away from Savala after receiving a report on him in 2018. Five years later, after receiving “reports of sexual abuse”, the denomination said that “it took appropriate actions,” which led to the dismissal of more than half a half dozen ministers.
“We have been disconsolate when listening to accusations related to Daniel Savala and the pain caused by his reported actions,” said the statement. “God’s assemblies remain in a strong opposition to the teachings and practices that followed.”
The leaders of the denomination rejected interview requests and did not answer detailed questions.
Savala has not submitted a plea for his positions in Texas, and he and his lawyers did not respond to comments requests. But in April 2023, when the accusations increased, he registered the confession in his living room; It is not clear what led him to do it. The granulated homemade video later distributed among the accusers of Savala and was shared with NBC News.
Contemplating how he managed to hide his misdeeds for so long, Savala’s eyes change momentarily, then his gaze returns to the camera.
“I had them all very well under my spell.”