Yankees icon Mariano Rivera and his wife Clara accused of covering up sexual abuse at their home
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A legal complaint accuses the Riveras of failing to take ‘sufficient action to end the sexual abuse’ of a minor. Yankees icon Mariano Rivera and his wife Clara covered up the sexual abuse of a minor girl at the couple’s home and at a Christian summer camp affiliated with the their church, according to a shocking new lawsuit filed in New York.
![[New Rochelle church Refugio de Esperanza – known as Refuge of Hope where Mariano Rivera is the lead pastor]](https://static.independent.co.uk/2025/01/22/14/326486994_752660985911268_106529546304901359_n.jpg)
Once Major League Baseball’s most authoritative closer, garnering the all-time highest Hall of Fame voting percentage – a perfect 100 percent – Rivera, 55, later became the lead pastor at the Refuge of Hope church in New Rochelle, 15 miles north of The Bronx.
![[Once Major League Baseball ’s most authoritative closer, garnering the all-time highest Hall of Fame voting percentage – a perfect 100 percent – Rivera, 55, later turned to his faith as a career]](https://static.independent.co.uk/2025/01/22/14/GettyImages-539917.jpg)
But last Thursday, a legal complaint was filed in the Supreme Court of Westchester County accusing the Riveras of being negligent in their supervision and allegedly failing to act upon learning that a young girl from their church was being sexually abused.
A Florida Pentecostal church affiliated with Refuge of Hope and the couple’s one-time New York home are at the center of the alleged scandal. According to the filing in the civil case, the plaintiff – known as “Jane Doe” – claims she was sexually abused by an older minor girl – anonymised as “MG” during a summer internship in 2018 at the Ignite Life Center in Gainesville, Florida, which was supported by Rivera’s church.
