Members of a religious cult on the West Coast appear to have
pressured at least one local store into pulling a book from
their shelves that argues their leader is a manipulative
sexual deviant.
The book, Sins of the Father, tells the story of Phil
Cooper who escaped from his father Neville's strict religious
community and in a daring night-time raid rescued his five
children from the sect.
Neville Cooper, who now goes by the name Hopeful Christian,
was jailed for 18 months for sex offences against his son and
some young women in the community.
Phil Cooper told the story of his life growing up in the
cult, detailed his father's offences and revealed how he and
his children were able to escape the oppressive cult in the
book that was released to stores this week.
About 500 people live in the cut-off community called the
Gloriavale Christian Community at Haupiri on the West Coast,
inland from Greymouth.
The group regularly shop in Greymouth and they run one of the
largest dairy farms on the West Coast called Canaan Farming
Ltd, which has dairy cattle, deer, ostriches and sheep.
The book was pulled temporarily from the shelves at The
Warehouse in Greymouth after some of the Gloriavale members
visited the store and spoke with a team leader, manager Craig
Bryant told the Greymouth Star.
"The team leader at the time thought she was doing the right
thing. It's back on sale now, it's in the book department."
Greymouth Paper Plus owner Doug Truman told NZPA he was
selling the book but would not confirm if it was only
available from behind the counter.
However, he said he had "chosen not to make a display on it".
He said the people from the Gloriavale community were in his
shop "all the time".
"They really are pretty loyal shoppers in the community so we
just give them the respect that they are due for that."
He would not confirm if he had been asked to pull the book
display by anyone from Gloriavale.
A spokesman for the Gloriavale community would not confirm if
any of their members had visited the stores.
"If you rang up the bookstores you'd find out whether that
was the case or not," he said.
Phil Cooper, who is in New Zealand for the book launch in
Christchurch last night, said he was not surprised the group
wanted the book hidden from view.
"My dad's running scared. Financially he's going to suffer
from this and he knows it. But (the book) wasn't written for
that motive."
Phil Cooper said the more the group attempt to cover up the
existence of the book, the more publicity it was going to
receive.
Neville Cooper's grandson Israel Cooper, who along with his
father helped author Fleur Beale write the book, said he
understood that business people did not want to bite the hand
that fed them.
However, he hoped freedom of information would be more
important than money.
"It went through my mind this might happen, but I didn't
think it would."
