TYSON OFFERED MINISTERS $5 MILLION

                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: WEDNESDAY, February 19, 1992                   TAG: 9202190258
SECTION: SPORTS                    PAGE: C6   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: 
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Short
TYSON OFFERED MINISTERS $5 MILLION
Boxer Mike Tyson offered $5 million two years ago to a church group whose leader now is seeking a lenient sentence for the convicted rapist.
The Rev. T.J. Jemison, president of the National Baptist Convention, said in January 1990 that Tyson offered the money to help the convention pay for its new headquarters in Nashville, Tenn.
The Rev. Melvin B. Girton of Indianapolis says Jemison heads a group calling itself the National Committee for Mercy for Mike Tyson, which is circulating petitions to be presented to Tyson's sentencing judge.
A woman who answered a call Tuesday at Mount Zion First Baptist Church in Baton Rouge, La. - Jemison's congregation - said the pastor couldn't be reached.
\ Two Kansas members of a nationwide sportsman's group filed a $75 million lawsuit against the organization's founder and other officials, claiming fraud.
The lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court in Wichita involves the Bass Anglers Sportsman Society, which has more than 500,000 members, about 7,600 of them in Kansas. Bradley Murray and Larry Neff, both of Wichita, claim BASS founder Ray W. Scott Jr. of Montgomery, Ala., defrauded the organization by creating a for-profit corporation without permission and pocketing revenues.

by Bhavesh Jinadra by CNB