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Aswad Ayinde, a Paterson, N.J. man on trial for charges stemming from impregnating three of his five daughters, believed that he was a prophet, according to court testimony. Beverly Ayinde, the ex-wife of the 54-year-old, was shocked to learn that her 12-year-old daughter was with child, and even more disturbed to learn who the father was.

“He said, ‘She could be pregnant from me,” Beverly testified Tuesday (Feb. 26). “My heart started racing.”

Ayinde, born Eric McGill, directed the Fugees video “Killing Me Softly,” for which he won an MTV Video Music Award in 1996. He has been charged with two counts of aggravated s-xaul assault, plus s-xual assault, and is said to have gotten his daughters pregnant in an attempt to create his own “blueblood” race.

For more than 15 years he controlled his family’s every mental and physical move. “He equaled himself to being a prophet,” Beverly said. “As time went on, he was god-like. I had to call him ‘my god.’ He equated himself to Jesus Christ…He would sit us all down and lecture us about his greatness and his power…At another point, he equated himself to Prince and Michael Jackson.”

According to her testimony, Ayinde told Beverly that spirits advised him to perform oral s-x on his then 8-year-old daughter. “I was shocked, I said ‘What are you talking about?’ He tried to present it in this very godly spiritual way.”

Beverly came to the states from England as a teenager, quickly meeting and falling in love with Aswad. They married in 1976, and while she was initially impressed with his vast knowledge of African history, things spiraled after the birth of each child. “Eric didn’t believe in doctors,” she explained.

The family was secluded from the outside world, with Aswad steering the ship. The children were home-schooled and beaten, along with their mother. The last five of her nine children also had no birth certificates or Social Security numbers. “He threatened to kill my children. He would cut them and put them in different places and I wouldn’t be able to prove anything because I didn’t have a birth certificate for them.”

When questioned by Passaic County Senior Assistant Prosecutor Lisa Squitiera about why she never contacted authorities, Beverly claims to have been too scared. “The way things were in the house, I couldn’t just do something. There would be hell to pay,” she said, crying.

In addition to being controlling, Ayinde walked around the house nude, and s-domized his daughter over 100 times. He was finally busted in 2006. when his 19-year-old daughter called police.

His trial is the second of five jury trials that he is facing. In 2010, he was convicted on all counts of m-lesting his 8-year-old daughter until she gave birth to his child as a teenager, and slapped with a 40-year sentence. Pending charges will put him behind bars for more than 100 years.

 

Photo: Carmine Galasso