Pawel Bielecki, known as “Father Paul,” has been charged by U.S. federal authorities with raising at least $650,000 for overseas medical clinics, claiming to operate in Lebanon but using the donations to fund an extravagant lifestyle in Manhattan. The cleric claimed to run medical clinics in conflict zones, the New York Post reported.
“Bielecki, known as the ‘Fraud Friar,’ exploited his clerical position to gain the trust of victims across the country and steal hundreds of thousands of dollars from them,” Damian Williams, U.S. attorney for the Southern District, told the New York Post.
For the past eight years, the priest has been deceiving compassionate people, soliciting donations through local radio shows and crowdfunding sites for non-existent hospitals and ambulances in Lebanon.
One of the tragedies the fraudster exploited the most was the August 4, 2020 chemical explosion in Beirut, which killed 218 people. Although the defendant claimed to have been injured in the disaster, tax authorities said he was not in Lebanon during that time, but instead made purchases at cafes and restaurants in the Big Apple. The investigation revealed that Bielecki did not leave the United States from December 2019 to April 2022.
According to the complaint, the cleric asked his victims in New York, New Jersey, Connecticut, Georgia and Florida to send checks to his convent with the note “Mission of Father Paul Bielecki” in the memo line. The funds obtained were transferred to personal accounts and used for lavish expenses, including $334 a month for a membership to a luxury gym.
One of the duped donors, Ralph Succar, told the New York Post: “Are you serious? Oh God, that is the worst news I have heard in years.” Succar, a community leader from Brooklyn, helped raise thousands of dollars at a 2018 charity event for Christian refugees in the Middle East. He said Bielecki was “very credible,” adding, “He was a very peaceful and gentle person, who came with a mission to help children in the Middle East.”
The cleric’s fraud was not limited to fundraising at events, as he also set up a non-profit called St. Francis in Beirut Inc. He also claimed at conferences that doctors along the Syrian border had been arrested.
The Brooklyn Reporter reported that Bielecki told the Salam Club of New York and the Verrazano Rotary Club that “doctors are being arrested along the Syrian border. I was supposed to have had four doctors with me, but now they are in jail.”
This fake cleric even legally changed his name to “Paul HRH Saxe-Coburg-Gotha,” in September 2023, with the “HRH” standing for “His Royal Highness,” the New York Post reported. According to the same source, Bielecki faces 40 years in prison on the federal charges filed.
The defendant is currently being held at a federal facility in Brooklyn as investigations continue.
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