Thursday, March 27, 2008

Trinity Church of Chicago Purchases $1.6M Home for Reverend Jeremiah Wright - In Dubious Business Transaction

The Reverend Jeremiah Wright - spiritual mentor to Illinois senator Barack Obama - is about to move into a new $1.6M home, purchased for him by his own church. But details of how the home was purchased raises some obvious questions:

Fox News - According to documents obtained from the Cook County Register of Deeds, Reverend JeremiahWright (Trinity Church of Chicago pastor) purchased two empty lots in Tinley Park, Ill., from Chicago restaurant chain owner Kenny Lewis for $345,000 in 2004.
Documents show Wright sold the property to his church, Trinity United, in December 2006, with the proceeds going to a living trust shared with his wife, Ramah.

The sale price for the land was just under $308,000, about $40,000 less than Wright’s original purchase two years earlier.

Public records of the sale show Trinity initially obtained a $10 million bank loan to purchase the property and build a new house on the land.

But further investigation with tax and real estate attorneys showed that the church had actually secured a $1.6 million mortgage for the home purchase, and attached a $10 million line of credit, for reasons unspecified in the paperwork. Read the full story at Fox News.