Iowa priest charged with ‘fake missionary’ fraud, theft

An Iowa priest has pled not guilty to criminal theft, after he was arrested last month on charges of stealing $164,000 from his rural parish.

Fr. Tom Thakadipuram. Credit: Fr. Tom Thakadipuram/Facebook.

According to court records, the priest deposited parish money into a bank account he created for a fake missionary organization, and from there transferred it into his own bank account. He is facing six counts of theft.

An expert in parish theft says the arrest is a reminder for dioceses to set clear policies about financial management, and to audit compliance regularly.

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Fr. Tom Thakadipuram, 61, was arrested last month and charged with seven criminal counts, after investigators found he had illicitly transferred parish money to his own bank accounts, using a fake missionary organization as a cover. Investigators say that when police approached him about the theft, he attempted to close some personal bank accounts and transfer the money elsewhere.

The most recent theft was in January, according to court records.

In a Feb. 20 affidavit, an Iowa police officer alleged that:

“The defendant on or about the 2nd day of January, 2025, removed CDs in cash funds from the bank in the amount of $24,000.00, relocating them to a false bank account to a missionary group where the account signer was himself. Immediately after depositing the monies in an attempt to conceal its whereabouts, he transferred the monies to another account in his personal name.”

Thakadipuram “claimed to trustees that he had been defrauded when he was the fraudulent party. Upon making contact with [Thakadipuram], he refused to speak with us, and the same day he attempted to close the accounts, again relocating the monies in an attempt to conceal its location and hide his wrongdoings.”

The priest was arrested Feb. 22, and released on a bail bond. He was charged with six counts of first degree theft, each of which can carry a 10-year prison term, and one count of second degree theft, which can carry a five-year prison term.

Thakadipuram’s attorney has not yet been reached for comment.

The Diocese of Des Moines told The Pillar that “Father Thakadipuram has resigned his position as pastor of St. Mary Parish, Shenandoah, and St. Mary Parish, Hamburg. The Diocese of Des Moines has arranged for the pastoral care of the parishioners of those two parishes until a more permanent priest placement occurs.”

The diocese told The Pillar that it is “honoring the canonical presumption of innocence, but has begun a canonical preliminary investigation to determine whether “a canonical penal process can be initiated or is expedient.”

“The diocese is committed to avoiding any interference with the secular criminal process,” a spokesperson told The Pillar.

In many dioceses it is commonplace to initiate preliminary investigations, as the Des Moines diocese did, but to delay canonical penal processes during the course of a state criminal investigation and trial, and to resume them subsequently.

For its part, the diocese said it “respects the investigation underway by law enforcement officials and will refrain from additional comment at this time.”

Thakadipuram, a former member of the Claretian religious order and a native of the southwest Indian state of Kerala, has been in U.S. parish ministry since at least 2011, and was before that president of a Claretian college seminary in India. In the early 2000s, the priest was a formator at St. John Vianney College Seminary in St. Paul, Minnesota.

A spokesperson from the Des Moines diocese told The Pillar that Thakadipuram is a “priest of Des Moines,” and was incardinated in the Iowa diocese in 2017.

In addition to his pastoral ministry, the priest is listed as an advisor to “Heartfelt Memorials,” a company which says it “co-creates… distinctive, virtual, end-of-life celebrations.” The company is led by “interfaith minister” Lennea Brinkerhoff and “Mindful Movement” facilitator Kit Pappenheimer.

Thakadipuram is not the only Iowa priest presently facing criminal charges for theft. In December, Fr. Steven McLoud of the Sioux City diocese was charged with embezzling nearly $70,000 from his parishes between 2017 and 2023. Prosecutors allege that McLoud altered bills and receipts and falsified mileage reports to be reimbursed by his parishes for fabricated expenses.

While the priest admitted to altering bills, he nevertheless pleaded not guilty to theft charges and is now awaiting trial.

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Rob Warren is a professor of accounting at Radford University and a retired IRS investigator. Warren has conducted extensive research into clerical theft, While his research has found that a very low percentage of parish priests steal, Warren urges dioceses to ensure appropriate internal controls to prevent the phenomenon.

He told The Pillar that dioceses can learn from Thakadipuram’s alleged theft, and create clearer policy regarding cash management.

“Internal controls are divided into preventive controls and detection controls. In this case, the detection controls appear to have worked because the fraud was discovered soon after the alleged fraudulent cashing of [parish] CDs,” Warren explained.

“The question here is what preventive controls could have been implemented to prevent the alleged fraud as it was occurring in the first place,” he said.

“While recognizing that hindsight is 20/20, the parish could have required a corporate resolution from the finance committee before cashing the CDs, or instructed the bank to not cash the CDs without the signature of both the pastor and a finance committee member.”

Neither Thakadipuram nor his attorney have responded to requests for comment.

This report was updated after publication to include additional details and comments from the Diocese of Des Moines.