Tony Alamo



Tony Alamo (accent on the second syllable), known also by other names such as Bernie LaZar Hoffman, Mark Hoffman, and Marcus Abad, was an American cult leader, child abuser, and figure of the Christian right. Alamo and his followers were known for leaving their literature, much of which was anti-Catholic and anti-American government, on car windshields across the country, as well as Alamo’s wild denim jackets that are quite sought after.

It’s not a compound, I swear
Alamo and his congregation lived in a compound (although he wanted us to call it a "campus" or his "seminary") in rural Crawford County, Arkansas. Alamo was known for finding people on the streets, such as drug addicts, and bringing them to his "campus" to work for his "ministry" for little more than room and board, effectively modern day slavery.

He was also known for being paranoid and vehemently anti-Catholic and anti-American government. In 1985, he distributed a pamphlet with a paranoid title about the following about Ronald Reagan and the Pope:

Did you know that the Pope and Ronald Reagan are a couple of Anti-Christ Devils and that they are selling us all down the drain?

Like other far right wing Christian fundamentalists, Alamo was steeped in conspiracy theories, such as the famous ones dealing with September 11, as well as less famous ones, like the American government being responsible for Pearl Harbor.

He was also accused of collecting money, supposedly for charity, that later got funneled back to Alamo himself. Other finances included his famously elaborate denim jackets that plenty of celebrities have worn.

Alamo was also noted for frequent appearances on shortwave radio, and his radio show lasted even when he was in prison.

Descent into the bizarre
In 1982, his wife Susan Alamo (née Edith Opal Horn) died of cancer. He became unhinged and, convinced he could raise her from the dead, kept her embalmed body on display for six months with members of his church praying around it. Her body was finally placed in a heart-shaped mausoleum, but it was found to be missing when the government seized the property in 1991. Her estranged daughter Christhiaon Coie sued Alamo for stealing the body, and her stepfather obtained a court order to have the body returned and finally entombed in Tulsa, Oklahoma.

Crime and punishment
Mr. Alamo, one day you will face a higher and greater judge than me. May he have mercy on your soul.

In the Bible it happened. But girls today, I don't marry 'em if they want to at 14-15 years old. We won't do it, even though I believe it's OK.

Alamo was incarcerated on several occasions, including a weapons-related offense in the 1960s and a tax-related charge in 1994, for which he served a six-year federal sentence. Besides the crimes for which he was imprisoned, Alamo was accused of multitudes of other offenses. He was accused of rape by dozens of former members of his "congregation", and former members have reported that he had as many as seven "wives", whom he married when they were still children. Alamo claimed that women are the property of men, and once a girl reaches puberty, she needs to marry and begin having children. Like all cult leaders before him, he justified this behavior by claiming voices in his head God talked to him and instructed him to do what he did.

Alamo's cult compound was raided by federal agents in September 2008 after reports of child sexual abuse. A few days later, he was arrested and charged with multiple crimes involving child sexual abuse and transporting minors across state lines for those purposes. He proudly declared that the age of consent is puberty. In 2014, several women who alleged they were sexually abused as children by Alamo were awarded $525 million by an Arkansas judge a week after the church failed to respond to a lawsuit.

He died in prison serving a life sentence under his birth name "Bernie LaZar Hoffman" at the United States Penitentiary in Butner, North Carolina. His former cult compound, long abandoned, exists in a dilapidated state in 2017. The website is still active and continues to produce literature for the group.