A pastor is behind bars for the serial abuse of a woman and several children.
Reverend James Haram put his traumatised victims through ordeals branded ‘truly awful’ by a judge.
This included the 51-year-old raping the woman. The youngsters who were preyed upon were often struck with a wooden spoon or a rod.
Haram – who had been with the Free Church of Scotland in Glasgow – was found guilty of a total of 19 charges of physical and sexual abuse.
The crimes spanned between 1997 and 2020 at addresses in the city as well as Dumbarton, Dunbartonshire and in Ayrshire.
Haram was remanded in custody at the High Court in Glasgow and will be sentenced in September.
The woman regularly suffered at his hands. He called her names, punched walls, threw household items around in anger and threatened to hit her with a piano stool.
He tracked where she went, checked who she was talking to and forced her to take part in religious activities.
Reverend James Haram put his traumatised victims through ordeals branded ‘truly awful’ by a judge
Haram once mowed over flowers the woman had taken time to grow. The pastor also suggested she should kill herself.
The violence escalated with Haram grabbing and choking the woman. She recalled her ‘whole body going limp’.
Jurors heard the Haram would pester the woman into sex while making biblical references. She was told that she had to ‘subject’ herself to him.
The victim recalled how she would sob with ‘tears down her face’.
But giving evidence, Haram claimed that ‘every sexual encounter was consensual’.
He claimed that the woman had ‘many wonderful gifts’, but that she had used them to ‘turn against’ him. He called her ‘incredibly convincing’.
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But, the reverend, of Dumbarton, did accept there were ‘occasional flare-ups of aggression’.
The abuse of the children was said to include carrying out ‘modesty checks’ on girls to see what they were wearing.
Prosecutor John Macpherson put to him that one girl gave ‘a fairly graphic account of some savagery’ of being ‘regularly beaten’.
He insisted this was ‘wholly fabricated’.
Jurors heard he flew into a rage while in a car with two children and claimed he would deliberately crash, killing them all.
But, Haram told the trial: ‘They knew I did not mean it.’
Judge Tom Hughes deferred sentencing for reports.
He told Haram: ‘I think it is fair to say this has been a deeply distressing case for everyone involved.
‘The jury has heard a different version of events from all the witnesses who gave evidence.
‘It appears that (what happened) was truly awful – incidents of violence, aggression, all sorts of difficulties and the sexual offending which took place.
‘During that period, you appeared to be living a life whereby you were acting in an official capacity as a man of the cloth.
‘You have now been convicted of extremely serious offences which will obviously carry a lengthy custodial sentence.’
Haram had been on bail, but was remanded meantime. He appeared to be clutching a Bible as he was led to the cells.
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