US televangelist Jim Bakker, disgraced from sex scandal and fraud, dies at 86

US televangelist Jim Bakker, disgraced by sex scandal and fraud, dies at 86

US televangelist Jim Bakker, who created a multimillion-dollar media empire before being jailed for fraud and conspiracy, has died at the age of 86.

Bakker and his then-wife Tammy Faye launched a Christian television programme called The PTL Club in 1974, and at its height it drew 13 million viewers a day.

His death was announced on Monday by his second wife, Lori Bakker, who called him "a pioneer of Christian television".

By the late 1980s, Bakker and Tammy Faye's empire had begun to unravel after he became caught up in a sex scandal and later a conviction for mail and wire fraud. Tammy Faye, who divorced him in 1992, was never charged.

Bakker remarried in 1998, and with his second wife Lori started a new TV ministry in 2003.

She did not give a cause of death.

Bakker's first programme, The PTL Club, "Praise the Lord" or "People That Love," was what made him famous alongside his first wife Tammy Faye.

The pair built their empire with 2,000 employees and the 2,300-acre (930-hectare) Heritage USA theme park complex in Fort Mill, South Carolina.

The Bakkers were known for their lavish lifestyle, with a private jet, several homes, luxury cars, jewellery and even an air-conditioned dog house.

In 1987, Bakker stepped down from the PTL ministry after revelations of a 1980 sexual encounter with former church secretary Jessica Hahn.

It later emerged that Hahn had received a $265,000 payoff using ministry funds, leading to Bakker being stripped of his ministerial credentials and his right to carry out religious duties.

Hahn also accused Bakker of sexual assault, although the evangelist denied it and said the encounter had been consensual.

Bakker was then convicted in 1989 on 24 counts of mail and wire fraud and conspiracy in a scheme involving their Christian theme park, and he served more than four years in prison.

Tammy Faye remained with her husband throughout the trial but divorced him in 1992 while he was in prison. She died of cancer in 2007.

After Bakker was released from prison in 1994, he wrote a book called "I Was Wrong" and married Lori in 1998.

The couple launched a TV ministry together in 2003, and in 2008 they began taping "The Jim Bakker Show".