Ray William Johnson: True Story Podcast - The Faith Healer Who Got Exposed As a Fraud - The Peter Popoff story

Episode Date: February 19, 2025

Peter Popoff is a controversial televangelist and self-proclaimed faith healer known for his fraudulent claims of divine healing powers. In the 1980s, he was exposed for using a hidden earpiece to receive personal information about audience members, which he falsely presented as divine revelations. Despite being publicly debunked, he made a comeback in the 2000s, selling "miracle spring water" and other religious products. His ministry continues to attract followers.

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His name is Peter, and Peter generally travels around the United States preaching in various venues. He also preaches on the radio a lot, but then in 1982, everything changes for him. Because he starts preaching on TV, and there he can see right away that he's going to make a ton of money off this. And so he comes up with this insane scam. Now the first part of this is he gathers these huge congregations to preach to. Then he starts faith healing, like he pretends he can heal people with his hands. He'll heal the blind, he'll cure cancer just by touching someone. Glory to God, there it is.

I'll tell you a release, a divine release. A God's power. And people believe this, and they'll come from all over the country to get healed. Here it comes in the mighty and the mighty and the... the matchless name of Jesus restoration. And so he finds a lot of success doing this. People are watching this on TV and they're donating. So now, bro, is really starting to get paid.

Oh, but that's not the only part of this scam. The other part is during his sermon, he'll call out the names of random people in the audience, people he's never met. And amazingly, Peter will already know a ton about them. He'll know their first and last name. He'll know their home address. He'll know what illnesses they're suffering from.

And he says he can do this, not because he's psychic, but that he can do this because his God is feeding all of this information to him. So it must be a miracle. And the audience sees this and they're like, how did he know all that information about this stranger? And they're always so impressed. And so his popularity grows and it grows. And soon his faith healing sermons are broadcast all over the U.S. and Canada

on 51 TV outlets and over 4,000 TV outlets, in over 40 different radio stations. And at this point, Peter is allegedly making over $500,000 a month. $500,000 a month in the 80s. Not only that, he and his ministry start selling all kinds of ridiculous blessed items, like Miracle Manor Bread, Holy Anointed Oil keychains, all kinds of shit. But whatever, Bro doesn't seem to care, because he's starting to get crazy rich now, And it seems like everyone believes him and no one is going to call him on his bullshit.

Until. Here's the thing, though. Not everyone watching Peter's sermons on TV are impressed. Specifically, this guy isn't impressed. James. And James, he's a stage magician and he's also a very popular skeptic. And he's publicly known to debunk scams and other things he finds bogus. And so James sees Peter's shows on TV and he's like, yeah, this guy's a con artist.

And so he gets a group of volunteers together, and they all decide to try and figure out exactly how Peter is pulling off this scam. And so James and this group, they go to one of Peter's sermons, and it's in this big auditorium, probably 10,000 people there. And at one point, the whole place is passing buckets around because they're collecting donations. And one of James's volunteers uses this as an excuse to get close to the stage so that he can get a good look at Peter. Once he's there, he notices Peter is wearing a hearing aid. And he thinks, well, that's weird. This guy can, like, heal people with his hands, yet he can't heal himself because he's wearing a hearing aid. So he goes back, and he tells James, and they conclude that that's not a hearing aid at all.

It's an earpiece, and someone must be feeding Peter information through that earpiece. So they all go to his next sermon to investigate further. This time, they bring a radio scanner, and one of James's volunteers dresses up, as a security guard and he stands in the back. And as soon as Peter comes on stage and starts preaching, their scanner intercepts his radio transmission and they can hear a voice through that scanner. I love you. I'm talking to you. Can you hear me? If you can't, you're in trouble.

Now that voice is this woman, Elizabeth. Elizabeth is Peter's wife and she is hidden in a different room and she's feeding Peter all this information through his earpiece. hot one for you. Robert K. Wood. Who is Robert Wood? Is it Robert? Robert Kwood? Kaywood?

Robert Kewood. It needs surgery. You need surgery. The doctors were going to do surgery on you. Okay, so here's how they were pulling off this scam. So the church would have the congregation fill out prayer cards before the sermon, and they would put them in a prayer box. And Peter's wife would sneak in and switch the boxes out. And then she would read people's information.

off the prayer cards to Peter through his earpiece. Right next to her is Morris Christman. Just a minute. Who is Morris? Chrisman. Yeah, he's got hernia on high bloodstream. You've got a hernia also. And as far as the faith healing goes, I mean, he's not really healing any of these people.

They just think he is because they're caught up in the moment because they're so hopeful and full of adrenaline. But he's not healing anyone. So anyway, James takes all of these recordings and he goes on The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson, Carson, which is the biggest show on TV during this time. And they play these recordings on the show for all of America to hear. And poor Peter is finally exposed as a fraud. So then he has to lie and publicly deny it. And first he says, no, that wasn't my wife feeding me information through an earpiece.

One of my haters hired an actor to try and set me up. In fact, he comes up with a bunch of excuses, but at the end of the day, the general public is like, fuck you, you're a con artist. And from there, donations to Peter's church slow down dramatically. And within a year, his whole organization files for bankruptcy. Oh, but that's not the end of Peter's story, because bro still loves money, and he's still determined to be rich. He's about to make a comeback. And so about 10 years go by, and Peter decides, yeah, he'll give that whole scamming religious people thing, another shot. But this time he decides to specifically target the black community. And so he starts to buy up commercial time slots on BET. And there he's advertising his sermons and he's soliciting

donations and he has this thing where he promises to heal people through the mail if they send him money. Not sure how that works. He also preaches the prosperity gospel where he tells people that if they send him a little money, that the Lord will then bless them in return by making them wealthy. It's ridiculous and transparently corrupt. Regardless, surely enough, Peter's Star starts to rise again, and the donations start rolling in. But I guess it's still not enough money for him, because then he comes up with his best yet most absurd idea yet, selling, and I'm not making this up, blessed holy water through the mail called Miracle Springwater. And this is apparently holy water that will not only heal you, but will make you rich.

You can be free to enjoy all of God's richest blessings. That's why he wants to send you your free packet of miracle spring water. Your point of contact for the miracle you need. And as stupid as that sound, it works and it works well. And over the next few years, he and his church become super fucking wealthy. In fact, by 2003, he and his organization are making over $9 million dollars a year. I will send you the miracle spring water. I'll send you the instructions. I'll tell you how to use it to see total victory in every area of your life. And by 2005, allegedly Peter's company makes $24 million

just that year alone. Then, of course, the church buys him a $4 million house to live in, tax-free because, you know, the church technically owns it. And later, they buy him a Bentley. And if that isn't depressing enough, apparently to this day, he's still out there preaching on TV and he's still running late night TV ads selling Miracle Springwater release your faith now by calling for your free packet of Miracle Springwater oh my god why