News Briefs June 12, 2015
Adventist Today regularly provides a summary of stories that we have decided do not require in-depth reporting, but our readers may want to be aware of.
A court ruled that an Adventist who was improperly fired for not working on Sabbath and awarded him $150,730 in back pay, reports the Adventist Review. Sean Mohammed was fired in 2011 by Mini Price Storage, a chain of self-storage businesses based in Virginia Beach, Virginia, The Virginian-Pilot newspaper reported Thursday. Mohammed had told the company when he was hired in 2007 that he had religious reasons why he could not work from sundown Friday to sundown Saturday, but a new supervisor pressed him to change and fired Mohammed when he refused. The company may appeal the decision of a United States Federal judge.
A former student at Southern Adventist University was indicted for sex crimes as a result of an incident that Adventist Today first reported in March. The Hamilton County grand jury has indicted Ari T. Guindon for sexual exploitation of a minor by electronic means because he sent sexually explicit images to an underage female, reported The Chattanoogan.com on Wednesday (June 10). He was a physical education major at the university. In an earlier statement the university said that on March 3, when officials “became aware of alleged inappropriate communications between … Guindon and two minors … faculty member contacted Guindon to discuss the allegations at which point Guindon was advised to seek counseling.” He is no longer enrolled at the university.
Alcyon Fleck, the Adventist co-founder of International Children’s Care (ICC), a ministry with orphans, died at the age of 93 on, reported the Adventist Review this week. In 1976, after a major earthquake in Central America, Fleck flew to Guatemala with her husband, Pastor Kenneth Fleck, to open a center for children left homeless and orphaned. Seed money was provided by La Liga, a volunteer physician group in southern California. The Flecks were invited by the union conference president because they had been missionaries in the region for many years. The project led to establishment of ICC in 1978. The charity has raised thousands of children over the years and its orphanages have been modeled after the first one in Guatemala. Fleck died on May 25 in Walla Walla, Washington, and was buried next to her husband, Kenneth, at a family graveside service. A memorial service will be held on September 5 at the Meadow Glade Adventist Church near Vancouver, Washington.
