FILE PHOTO: Naason Joaquin Garcia, the head of a Mexican-based church estimated to have more than 1 million followers worldwide, appears in court in Los Angels, California, U.S., June 10, 2019. REUTERS/Ringo Chiu/File Photo
NEW YORK (Reuters) -The leader of a Mexico-basedmegachurch with 5 million followers worldwide has been hit with federal sex trafficking charges in the United States, prosecutors said on Wednesday.
Naason Joaquin Garcia, the self-styled apostle of the Guadalajara-based evangelical church La Luz del Mundo (Light of the World), was taken into federal custody in California, where he is serving a sentence of 16 years and eight months in prison after pleading guilty in 2022 to state-level charges of sexually abusing three girls.
