After nearly a year of duelling filings and a failed effort to recover more than $76,000 in legal fees, Bishop TD Jakes has voluntarily dismissed a defamation lawsuit against ex-pastor-turned-registered sex offender Duane Youngblood, who accused Jakes of sexually assaulting him 40 years ago.
“Pursuant to Rule 41(a)(1)(a)(ii), Plaintiff Thomas Dexter Jakes hereby gives notice that the above-captioned action is voluntarily dismissed by consent of all parties who have appeared in this action,” the brief notice of dismissal filed by both attorneys for Jakes and Youngblood in the US District Court for the Western District of Pennsylvania last Thursday.
Jakes, 68, who founded The Potter's House megachurch in Dallas, Texas, filed the defamation lawsuit against 59-year-old Youngblood on November 25, 2024, a day after he suffered what was later revealed to be a heart attack while preaching.
Youngblood claimed in interviews with internet personality Larry Reid on his "Larry Reid Live" show on October 28 and November 3, 2024, that Jakes assaulted him when he was about 18 or 19 years old.
Jakes has denied the allegations. Youngblood claimed to Reid that he had been talking with Jakes for about two hours at the home of an older adult clergywoman, where he was staying during a local church revival approximately 40 years ago, when Jakes tried to kiss him.
"After sitting there and having this long discourse with him, I finally looked at my watch, and I'm like, 'Oh my goodness, I got to go. I got to get this car back to my mother. She's gonna kill me.' So I said to bishop, 'I got to get up,'" Youngblood recalled.
"And I got up from the table, he got up from the table, he walked around toward the way I had to exit quicker than I got over there, and when I started to walk past him, he pulled me to himself, wrapped his arms around me, and tried to kiss me. And in that moment, I literally died."
The morning after the encounter, Youngblood alleges Jakes called his home and intimated that he wanted him to become a local sex partner.
Youngblood’s older brother, Pastor Richard Edwin Youngblood, also accused Jakes of attempting to sexually assault him years ago while he shared a hotel room with the bishop during a ministry trip.
"He secured a room with two beds in it, and we went to the room for the night. That night, while I was lying in my bed, I felt Elder Jakes climb into my bed. He pressed his body against mine and asked, 'Youngblood, do you feel that?' He was referencing his erection that he was pressing against my backside," Richard Youngblood wrote in his affidavit.
"I got up out of bed in complete shock as he also [got] up from the opposite side and met me. He grabbed me by my arms and pulled me to him and started trying to kiss me. At this point, I cannot believe what is happening to me."
Other men also made sworn affidavits in support of Duane Youngblood's claims, including Jeffrey S. Gray, who also shared Duane Youngblood's disclosures about Jakes; Daniel B. Spaulding, LaShawn Youngblood, Joshua Munoz and Landon Claybourne.
In August, Duane Youngblood’s former attorney on the case, Tyrone Blackburn, was sanctioned for submitting fabricated quotations and misleading analysis of case law due to his reliance on artificial intelligence. He also claimed to represent the convicted ex-husband of Jakes’ eldest daughter, Cora Jakes, and other unnamed males who he claims have made credible allegations against the Potter's House founder of grooming, sexual assault, sexting and transporting them across state lines.
Cora Jakes’ ex-husband, Richard Brandon Coleman, 36, also known by his stage name SkiiVentura, is serving time in a Texas prison for aggravated sexual assault of a child and indecency with a child.
“From the inception of this lawsuit, I informed Mr. Pusch that I am planning to file a class action lawsuit for several male sexual assault survivors against Plaintiff TD Jakes. Dustin Pusch created Mr. Jake's [sic] present reality by foolishly filing this suit against Mr. Youngblood in hopes of bullying him into signing away his right to speak publicly of the childhood trauma visited upon him by TD Jakes,” Blackburn wrote in one of his filings.
“Unfortunately, Plaintiff Jakes failed to anticipate the avalanche of survivors who would come forward with evidence of Plaintiff grooming, sexually assaulting, sexting, and transporting them across state lines in violation of the MANN Act. One of the accusers is now Mr. Jake's [sic] former son-in-law, Richard Brandon Coleman.”
That lawsuit threatened by Blackburn has not been filed, and Jakes has vehemently denied that he harbors “carnal desires” for men.
“I have reviewed the affidavits of Duane Youngblood and Richard Youngblood submitted in support of the motion to dismiss. The statements in these affidavits purport to describe situations where I harbored carnal desires for these men. These statements are knowingly and flagrantly false,” Jakes, wrote in an affidavit in response to the allegations against him. “I am repulsed by these defamatory accusations ... ”
