☎️ G.O.D. Int’l and Gregg Garner Sued for Sex Trafficking and Forced Labor

An article was posted on 3/4/26 by Ministry Watch titled “G.O.D. International and Former Leader Sued for Sex Trafficking and Forced Labor”. 

The lawsuit describes horrific acts, including grooming a minor, forced oral sex, and rape without condoms.

Ministry Watch was the first publication to report on the lawsuit, which involves the following parties:

PLAINTIFFS

JANE DOE 1
JANE DOE 2
JANE DOE 3

v.

DEFENDANTS

GREGG GARNER, an individual,

GLOBAL OUTREACH DEVELOPMENTS INTERNATIONAL (G.O.D), a nonprofit corporation,

INSTITUTE FOR G.O.D. INTERNATIONAL, a nonprofit corporation,

THE CHURCH COMMUNITY FOR G.O.D., a nonprofit corporation, and

DOES 5-20, inclusive

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Plaintiffs are requesting a jury trial.

Below are excerpts from the 47-page court filing.

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The COMPLAINT reads as follows:

Between 2022 to 2025, Gregg Garner, the charismatic leader of G.O.D. International, sexually abused and assaulted multiple women who were members of G.O.D., coercing his victims to participate in numerous sex acts, including sexual intercourse. Garner also coerced his victims through the threat of serious harm into providing unpaid labor and services. Garner exploited his position of trust as the spiritual leader of G.O.D., using the tools of cult indoctrination, such as food and sleep deprivation, social isolation, and extreme emotional abuse, to further his psychological control of his victims. Garner controlled every aspect of his victims’ lives, including their schooling, their employment, their spouse’s employment, their housing, even the schooling of their children, and used this control to reward compliance with his abusive scheme and to ensure his victims’ silence. While Garner preached a message of sexual purity, his victims endured his acts of sexual prurience for years, terrified that any resistance would tear apart their lives.

Plaintiffs Jane Does 1-3 now bring this action against Defendants for conspiring to operate, and for operating, a sex and labor trafficking venture (“Venture”) under the umbrella of religious and educational organizations centered around Garner. Defendants conspired to participate in, and participated in, the Venture to commit sex trafficking, peonage, forced labor, and human trafficking offenses in violation of Chapter 77 of Title 18. The central purpose of the conspiracy and Venture was to entice Plaintiffs to join Garner’s religious community and businesses, which functioned as both a high-control coercive group and a system of economic exploitation. Defendants exerted comprehensive power over Plaintiffs, took their money, made it financially and psychologically difficult, and in some cases impossible, to leave the coercive sexual and psychological abuse of Garner, and systematically abused Plaintiffs physically, sexually, emotionally, and economically.

In doing so, Defendants achieved numerous benefits including enriching Defendant Garner and entity Defendants, wielding power over others, advancing Garner’s status as religious leader and business owner, and providing Garner with sexual access to multiple women simultaneously. Defendant Garner also benefited financially through receipt of profits from multiple business entities and substantial access to free labor, including massage therapists, personal assistants, and other professional services totaling thousands of hours valued at over $800,000.

In pursuit of both the conspiracy and the Venture, Defendants engaged in a variety of wrongdoing, some tortious and some criminal. Defendant Garner played the critical role in the conspiracy as founder, leader, and sole beneficiary of systematic exploitation. Neither the conspiracy nor the Venture could have functioned without his comprehensive control over every aspect of Plaintiffs’ lives: employment, income, housing, children’s education, spiritual community, healthcare, and personal relationships. It was foreseeable that each Plaintiff would be harmed by this conduct, and all conspirators are liable for the entire amount of physical, emotional, psychological, and economic harm caused to Plaintiffs.

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It is important to note that Gregg is not the sole alleged perpetrator.

Defendants are listed as follows:

7. Defendant Gregg Garner is an individual residing in Old Hickory, Davidson County, Tennessee and was the Chief Executive Officer of Global Outreach Developments International during the operative time.

8. Defendant Global Outreach Developments International (G.O.D.) is a Tennessee non-profit corporation licensed to transact business in Tennessee. Its principal office address is 401 Center St., Old Hickory, TN 37138-2417. Its registered agent for service of process is Genovations Accounting, LLC, located at the same address.

9. Defendant Institute for G.O.D. International is a Tennessee non-profit corporation licensed to transact business in Tennessee. Its principal office address is 401 Center St., Old Hickory, TN 37138-2417. Its registered agent for service of process is Genovations Accounting, LLC, located at the same address.

10. Defendant The Church Community for G.O.D. is a Tennessee non-profit corporation licensed to transact business in Tennessee. Its principal office address is 401 Center St., Old Hickory, TN 37138-2417. Its registered agent for service of process is Genovations Accounting, LLC, located at the same address.

11. Defendant Individuals Does 5 through 9 are church members and leaders who participated in the sex trafficking conspiracy and/or enabled clergy abuse. Plaintiffs name them as “Doe” Defendants with the expectation that their identities will be ascertained after reasonable discovery.

12. Defendant Entities Does 10 through 20 are nonprofit and for-profit corporations used by Defendants in furtherance of the sex trafficking conspiracy. Plaintiffs name them as “Doe” Defendants with the expectation that their identities will be ascertained after reasonable discovery.

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FACTUAL BACKGROUND

16. Plaintiffs’ claims arise out of their involvement with a network of religious and business organizations based in Nashville, Tennessee and founded, operated, and controlled by Defendant Garner.

17. Defendant Garner presented himself to the community as a pastor, Bible teacher, marriage counselor, business mentor, and humanitarian leader dedicated to serving the poor and marginalized while living a modest lifestyle. In reality, Garner operated a sophisticated trafficking and forced labor venture designed to exploit young women for unpaid labor, extract money from followers, and to maintain a group of women whom he could sexually victimize through grooming, enticement, and coercion.

18. Garner’s principal operations included religious organizations (Church for G.O.D., Institute for G.O.D.), educational institutions (Academy for G.O.D.), and multiple non-profit and for-profit entities including Soma Wellness LLC (massage therapy), Hopewell Family Care LLC (medical practice), The Arts at Center Street (arts education), MCH Nashville LLC (construction/homebuilders), and others—creating as many as twelve domestic business entities plus operations in Africa and El Salvador.

A. Garner Used His Position as Founder, Lead Pastor, and CEO of G.O.D. to Perpetrate a Sex Trafficking and Forced Labor Scheme

19. Beginning in at least 2022 and continuing to at least 2025, Garner used his position as founder, lead pastor, and Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of G.O.D., the Institute for G.O.D., and the Church Community for G.O.D. (collectively, “the G.O.D. Entities”) to use force and coercion to sexually abuse and assault Jane Doe 1, Jane Doe 2, and Jane Doe 3, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 1591.

20. Garner also used serious harm and threats of serious harm, including psychological, reputational, and financial harm to Jane Does 1-3 and their family members, to coerce Plaintiffs to provide compelled and unpaid labor and services, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 1589. Garner induced students and community members to work for his businesses at below-market wages or without compensation, extracting thousands of hours of unpaid professional services. For example, for Jane Doe 3, it is estimated that she performed professional services valued at over $800,000 for which she was not properly compensated.

21. At all relevant times, Garner was the CEO, lead pastor and spiritual leader of the G.O.D. entities, located in the Lakewood community which he founded in 2003 in the greater Nashville area.

22. Garner used his position as spiritual leader to indoctrinate young members/recruits into the G.O.D. Entities, exerting near total control over their education, finances, employment, romantic and personal lives, to the point where Garner psychologically controlled his victims. Garner also groomed his victims for years, eroding their physical and emotional barriers, normalizing sexual speech and conduct, and ultimately enticing Jane Does 1-3 to participate in nonconsensual and coerced sex acts.

23. Garner used three primary means and methods to recruit, entice, harbor, provide, obtain, maintain, and solicit Plaintiffs, including but not limited to: (1) providing schooling, employment and housing to Plaintiffs and, in the cases of Jane Does 2 and 3, to their husbands and schooling to their children; (2) grooming and enticing Plaintiffs over the course of years, through normalizing sexual comments and touch, and eroding any physical and sexual barriers; and (3) using his position as lead pastor and spiritual leader to effectively brainwash Plaintiffs, creating an environment where they placed complete trust in him, thereby allowing him to entice Plaintiffs to participate in sexual activities they would otherwise refuse, and manipulating them to remain under his control within the G.O.D. community.

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a. Grooming Methodology

24. Garner employed systematic grooming tactics refined over decades, targeting young women when they were teenagers or young adults in positions of vulnerability and trust.

25. Phase 1 - Establishment of Authority (Ages 15-21): Garner met victims as their teacher, pastor, or spiritual mentor, establishing himself as authority figure worthy of complete trust and obedience. He singled them out as “special,” provided individual attention, and positioned himself in multiple overlapping roles (teacher + pastor + counselor + future employer). During this time, Garner would also take victims on “mission trips” where physical and emotional boundaries were eroded. Further, to the extent any victim dated a person who was not a member of the church, he would interfere and threaten their relationship, threatening ex-communication from the church.

26. Phase 2 - Isolation and Control (Young Adulthood): Garner enrolled victims in his Bible college (the Institute), limited their contact with the outside world, hired victims into his businesses, married or counseled their marriages, employed their spouses, enrolled their children in his schools, controlled their housing through his construction company and the G.O.D. Entities’ land acquisition, and became their complete social world. Departure became impossible without catastrophic loss.

27. Phase 3 - Physical Boundary Erosion (Years of Employment): Garner gradually eroded physical boundaries through: shoulder rubs and neck massages; forced napping together on office couches; groping “in his sleep”; sharing hotel rooms abroad; cornering victims and engaging in forced/noncompliant kissing; public requests to “check his pants” because his penis was “so big, it was hard to hide.”

28. Phase 4 - Sexual Exploitation (2022-2025): After years of grooming and control, Garner escalated to sexual assault through: requesting nude photos via the Signal application, an encrypted form of text communication; exposing his genitals during massage sessions; groping during social gatherings; kissing on the lips; on at least one occasion, drugging with a THC vape pen; forced oral sex; rape without condoms; and maintaining simultaneous sexual relationships with all three Plaintiffs and other known and suspected victims, without their knowledge of each other.

29. Phase 5 - Maintenance Through Coercion: Garner maintained control through: threats that disclosure would destroy the ministry and be the victims’ fault; commands to “take it to the grave”; turning off victims’ phone location tracking and ordering them to lie to husbands; creating financial dependency through underpayment; using spiritual authority to justify continued sexual relationships; and retaliation against employees who set boundaries.

b. Coercion through Psychological, Reputational, and Financial Control

30. Garner used psychological, reputational, and financial control to coerce Plaintiffs, and the threat that the victims could lose their community, jobs, and housing by crossing him or revealing the abuse he was perpetrating, namely, coerced sex acts and compelled labor and services. Absent such coercion, Plaintiffs would never have willingly participated in sex acts with Garner, nor would they have provided compelled and uncompensated labor and services to Defendants.

i. Psychological Control

31. Garner recruited young adults into G.O.D. with Jane Does 1-3 recruited between the ages of 15-22. During Phase 1 of Garner’s grooming and recruitment, Plaintiffs traveled with him on missions’ trips abroad. Garner led these trips and used traditional cult-like methods to indoctrinate Plaintiffs. Plaintiffs were often deprived of food, sleep, information, any sense of time/schedule, and contact with the outside world. During these trips, Garner would alternate between verbal abuse, berating the recruits in front of each other, and lavishing them with attention and praise. These wild swings of behavior left Jane Does 1-3 in a state of constant apprehension as to whether they would receive approval from Garner or incur his abuse for some unanticipated failure. This became a powerful form of psychological control. The recruits were conditioned to always seek Garner’s favor. Any kind/positive word was felt powerfully by a recruit and became a form of status in the group.

32. After their missions’ trips, and at Garner’s direction, Plaintiffs each enrolled in the Institute for G.O.D., the Bible-based college which Garner also founded and ran. Garner’s psychological control over the recruits became total in this setting: he controlled and monitored students’ contacts with the outside world, including forbidding dating outside the Institute, and managed every aspect of their daily lives. At least one Plaintiff became estranged from her family who questioned Garner’s methods and worried that he was using cult-like methods to control and isolate his recruits.

33. Garner continued to control all aspects of Plaintiffs’ lives after their graduation from the Institute for G.O.D. Garner assigned Jane Does 1-3 to jobs within the G.O.D. Entities, including for-profit entities owned in whole or majority part by Garner, stating that it was part of God’s plan for them to perform this work, even if they had no prior experience or training to perform such labor. In some instances, Garner would verbally abuse Plaintiffs, to create a constant fear and apprehension about their job performance, and then demand Plaintiffs perform additional labor without pay.

34. Throughout, Garner maintained comprehensive psychological and financial control over Plaintiffs’ lives by simultaneously occupying multiple positions of authority over each victim, and in many instances, their spouses’ employment: pastor, employer, marriage counselor, business partner, financial advisor, and children’s educator. This consolidation of power created an inescapable web of control where setting boundaries or leaving would result in loss of employment, housing, children’s education, spiritual community, and social connections—making departure financially and psychologically impossible.

ii. Reputational Control

35. If anyone crossed Garner or left the G.O.D. community, he insisted on complete ostracization of the former member. Garner told recruits/members not to talk with, nor associate with, the departed member again. Because Plaintiffs’ entire lives revolved entirely around the G.O.D. community, with their employment, housing, finances, and extended family tied to Garner-run entities, the possibility of ostracization terrified them and served as a powerful form of control.

iii. Financial Control

36. Jane Does 1-3 worked for Garner, received housing through him, and in the case of Jane Doe 2 and Jane Doe 3, their husbands were also employed by a Garner entity. The children of Jane Does 2 and 3 also attended the Academy for G.O.D. Any attempt by Plaintiffs to leave the G.O.D. community would have been financially impossible given the extensive level of control Garner held.

37. The housing was all in the same “neighborhood.” Garner decided who lived where and the houses once acquired by someone in the G.O.D. community were typically sold to other community members. This neighborhood was located within walking distance to the Academy where all of the members’ children attended.

c. Benefits to Victims

38. Immediately upon engaging in coerced sex acts, a victim’s position with Garner would improve, i.e., Garner’s abusive comments would stop, and Garner would offer things like access to a company credit card, improved employment conditions, and additional income. These benefits were offered in the context of the coerced sex act, often in the same room before or immediately after the sex act, or in the context of a victim threatening to take some kind of action to reveal the assaults. These benefits also served a coercive end, as Garner could continue to use the victims’ extreme financial dependence as a means of control.

39. In effect, Garner’s sex acts were part of a quid-pro-quo employment arrangement with Plaintiffs where sexual compliance was exchanged for continued employment and avoidance of retaliation. Plaintiffs lacked the means to end Garner’s sex acts because the financial costs, i.e., loss of employment was too great. In exchange for their continued participation in Garner’s coerced sex acts, Plaintiffs not only maintained their jobs, but received slightly more tolerable and less abusive working conditions.

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What follows in the court documents are each of the Jane Does harrowing accounts. We will not post that section here, but you can view/download the entire court filing here.

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E. Plaintiffs Experienced and Continue to Experience Severe Harm and Damages

190. At all times material hereto, Plaintiffs have been and are continuously harmed by Garner and the G.O.D. entities

191. Plaintiffs’ ongoing injuries include, but are not limited to:

• Bodily injury,

• Extreme psychological harm,

• Deprivation of property and income,

• Deprivation of a right to privacy, and

• Emotional distress.

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COUNT I
Sex Trafficking, 18 U.S.C. §§ 1591, 1594, and 1595 (on behalf of all Plaintiffs against all Defendants)

COUNT II
Forced Labor, 18 U.S.C. §§ 1589, 1594 and 1595 (on behalf of all Plaintiffs against all Defendants)

COUNT IV
THRA Sexual Harassment
(on behalf of all Plaintiffs against all Defendants)

COUNT V
THRA Retaliation
(on behalf of all Plaintiffs against all Defendants)

COUNT VI
Assault and Battery
(on behalf of all Plaintiffs against all Defendants)

COUNT VII
Intentional Infliction of Emotional Distress (on behalf of all Plaintiffs against all Defendants)

COUNT VIII
Negligent Infliction of Emotional Distress (on behalf of all Plaintiffs against all Defendants)

COUNT IX
Negligent Hiring/Retention/Supervision
(on behalf of all Plaintiffs against Defendants G.O.D. Entities)

COUNT X
Negligence
(on behalf of all Plaintiffs against all Defendants)

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A Statement from Christopher, a member of The Collective

3/6/2026

We often refer to ourselves as a “collective”. I would describe our team as a disparate group of concerned citizens and neighbors—mostly comprised of ex-members and loved ones of current and former members. The owner of the website and domain remains anonymous.

We have directly, and through shared testimony, witnessed the trauma inflicted on members actively involved in the organization. We also bear witness to the residual trauma experienced by folks who have managed to exit the organization. Many are still healing as they attempt to piece their lives back together.

We have been speaking out since 2021 about our concern with the cult-like practices engaged in by G.O.D. International and Gregg Garner for almost 30 years.

In addition to developing a significant compound in the Hopewell neighborhood of Old Hickory, they have also managed to build an intricate web of affiliated businesses throughout the Nashville area in a variety of different fields: a pediatric and primary care medical clinic, a wellness/massage practice, doula/birth services, youth and adult sports leagues, a real estate firm, a construction/handyman business, a suite of business services offered under the “Genovations” banner, a popular food truck, two popular photography businesses, an arts center, a dance academy for youth, to name a few.

Our website has served as a platform for people to voice their concerns and share their personal stories.

It was brought to our attention this week that at least three women have courageously come forward to testify in a lawsuit against Gregg Garner and G.O.D. International, alleging sex trafficking and forced labor. The lawsuit describes horrific acts, including grooming a minor, forced oral sex, and rape without condoms. We stand with the victims and urge swift justice.

We will continue to amplify the voices of the oppressed and raise awareness about these issues, remaining committed to our mission: “In seeking truth, we expose the lies. In pursuing justice, we hold the abusers of power accountable. In spreading information, we aim to liberate those who wish to be free. We are relentless.”

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