OSA RETURNS TO CENTRAL OHIO

The fourth annual Pass the Salt/New Beginnings camp meeting, Revival at the River, opened Wednesday at New Beginnings Church in Warsaw. Besides bon fires, horseshoes and worship, the revival features Operation Save America director Flip Benham, OSA operative and Ohio convicted sex offender Scott Heldreth, and of course, Minutemen United founder Coach Dave Daubenmire and New Beginnings pastor, Bill Dunfee. Dr. Patrick Johnston and his wife Elizabeth will lead family worship services on Friday and Saturday. Coach is scheduled to speak Thursday, Saturday, and Sunday evenings, and Benham will speak Friday evening and Saturday and Sunday mornings. According to an announcement emailed this morning which included the roster of guests, they will deliver messages "guaranteed to motivate and inspire."

Friday and Saturday the camp meeting will pull up stakes temporarily and converge on Columbus "abortion mills."

Benham arrives in Central Ohio fresh from the OSA'a week-long occupation of Jackson, Mississippi. Dr. Johnston was arrested there for obstructing traffic and protesting without a permit at St. James Episcopal Church during a Sunday morning anti-abortion demonstration.

In 1992 Scott Heldreth, was charged with 1 count of kidnap and 2 counts of criminal rape of at 18-year old woman at the Ohio University golf course. He later pled down to 1 count of sexual battery and was granted shock probation from Pickaway Correctional Institute after only 6 weeks incarceration. He is a registered sex offender in Illinois. The Florida, registery lists him as "released." Heldreth currently lives in North Carolina but is not listed in that state's sex offender registry since North Carolina's law pertains only to convictions after January 1, 1996. (Note: type Heldreth's name in at registry sites to get data.) As far as I know his last visit to Columbus was in July 2004 for OSA's take-over of City Hall Plaza (and here).

Most recently Heldreth was in the news when his oldest son, Joshua, then 10, was arrested at the Good Friday 2005 Terri Schiavo Death Watch in Pinellas Park, Florida when he attempted to take water to Schiavo. Go here for my article on the Heldreths at Pinellas Park.