Rejected Salary Bonuses ‘75% of Time,’ Bakker Says

Television evangelist Jim Bakker, defending himself under cross-examination today against charges that he enriched himself at the expense of the faithful, claimed that he rejected salary bonuses offered by the board of his PTL ministry “75% of the time.”

Bakker, who testified on direct examination Friday that he regretted the huge salaries and bonuses he took from PTL, told jurors today that he did not seek salary bonuses and that the board was aware of his ministry’s money problems when it boosted his pay.

“It was my policy not to participate in my salary, so I don’t know why they didn’t know what I was making,” Bakker said under questioning from federal prosecutor Deborah Smith.

“I’m saying I did not set my salary. The board, over the years, set my salary. I was not in the room when they voted my salaries. Seventy-five percent of the time, I asked them not to give me bonuses.”

Bakker, 49, is charged with 24 counts of criminal fraud and conspiracy in the sale of lifetime “partnerships” at PTL, a deal that typically offered three nights lodging annually for life at PTL’s Heritage USA development in Ft. Mill, S.C., to anyone giving the ministry at least $1,000.

Federal prosecutors, in a trial that has lasted more than five weeks, have introduced evidence portraying Bakker as a money-grubbing, high-living con artist.