Tulsa pastor
arrested on lewdness charge

A member of the Southern Baptist Convention's executive committee was arrested on a lewdness charge, having been accused of propositioning a plainclothes policeman outside a hotel in Tulsa, Okla., police said. Lonnie Latham, senior pastor at South Tulsa Baptist Church, was booked into Oklahoma County Jail Tuesday night on a misdemeanor charge of offering to engage in an act of lewdness, police captain Jeffrey Becker said. Latham was released on $500 bail Wednesday afternoon. According to police, Latham, who has spoken out against homosexuality, asked the officer to join him in his hotel room for oral sex. Latham was arrested, and his 2005 Mercedes automobile was impounded, Becker said. Calls to Latham at his church were not immediately returned Wednesday. The arrest took place in the parking lot of the Habana Inn, which is in an area where the public has complained about male prostitutes flagging down cars, Becker said. The plainclothes officers was investigating these complaints. The lewdness charge carries a penalty of up to one year in jail and a $2,500 fine. Latham is one of four Southern Baptist Convention executive committee members from Oklahoma. He spoke out last year against a measure, ultimately approved by voters, to expand tribal gaming. He has also spoken out against same-sex marriage and in support of a Southern Baptist Convention directive urging its 42,000 churches to befriend gays and lesbians and try to convince them that they can become heterosexual "if they accept Jesus Christ as their savior and reject their sinful, destructive lifestyle." The Southern Baptist Convention is the nation's largest Protestant denomination. (AP)