Shock, denials follow removal of 88 children from Louisa County camp

Shekinah Glory Camp is a few modest buildings on a converted portion of farmland in rural Columbus Junction where 105th Street bends into Q Avenue.

On Tuesday afternoon the camp was a hot, dusty place notable for the two television news cameramen parked on the gravel road in front of the small, one-story gray home that serves as the camp's headquarters.

Until late last week, the camp was packed with almost 90 teenagers enrolled in a faith-based substance abuse recovery camp. But the campers were all gone and a young man was one of those who remained behind and attempted to answer questions about what happened to all the campers.

"Most of them were here for substance abuse," said the volunteer, who did not use his name at the direction of an attorney. "They come here for God."

He denied the allegations of child abuse and endangerment that emerged after a raid on the camp late last week.

The operation

On Thursday and Friday, the Louisa County Sheriff’s Office, in collaboration with the Iowa Department of Health and Human Services, Iowa Division of Criminal Investigation and the Columbus Junction Police Department conducted a safeguard child protective custody operation, taking protective custody of 88 campers who were attending the Kingdom Ministry of Rehabilitation and Recreation's Shekinah Glory Clamp.

More than 40 Iowa Department of Health and Human Services officers were brought in from across the state to conduct the operation.

Louisa County Sheriff Brandon Marquardt said while no arrests had been made as of Tuesday morning, he believes there will be arrests soon.

The Louisa County Sheriff’s Office assisted HHS with the execution of search warrants at 10431 Q Ave. in Columbus Junction and 1101 Fifth Ave. in Fredonia, which has a Columbus Junction address. The addresses are to the Kingdom Ministry of Rehabilitation and Recreation and the Shekinah Glory Camp.

David Cung Nuam, the owner of both properties, did not respond to requests for comment.

“The claims came from the Department of Human Services of Iowa — of abuse and endangerment of the children attending the home in Fredonia and at the camp north of Carroll,” Marquardt said.

Marquardt said due to the ongoing investigation, much of the information still is confidential. All the children who were removed have been returned to their parents. Some of the children had been kept in foster care while their parents came from out of state to pick them up.

Asked about the children’s condition during the warrant execution, Marquardt said that all the children were in good enough health to be moved to a nearby church and questioned by HHS workers.

A ‘mind-blowing’ event

The volunteer at Shekinah Glory Camp who spoke with the Quad-City Times on Tuesday said he lived at the camp for one year and denied the allegations of abuse.

He echoed the claims of Victor Bawi, the son of Kingdom Ministry of Rehabilitation and Recreation ministers, who Monday told WQAD that camp organizers are innocent and investigators will not find evidence of abuse. Both Bawi and the volunteer said the allegations of abuse stem from the complaint of one camper.

Local residents said they were shocked to learn of the removal of campers. A neighbor on 155th Street described the people who live at the camp as "very pleasant" and "good neighbors." She said there were always children playing soccer and volleyball at the camp.

Raul Amigon, co-owner of Rey De Reyes Mexican Grocery in Columbus Junction, said news of the operation was "mind-blowing," and he thinks it could be a "huge misunderstanding."

Pizza for campers

Before the operation, campers lived at a complex that included the small headquarters house, two prefabricated metal, air-conditioned buildings, outbuildings and two sheds.

A volleyball net and soccer field are part of the complex.

Tim Johnson, pastor at Wapello Methodist Church, said the Louisa County Sheriff’s Office contacted the church to offer overnight services for some campers who did not return home the night of the operation.

Johnson said officials from the Iowa Department of Health and Human Services worked with the campers, who were mostly teenagers.

Johnson said he did not talk with any of the campers, but that a local pizzeria provided pizza for them.

Alex Murphy, spokesperson for HHS, had not returned an email asking for additional information before press time.

The ministry’s history

The Kingdom Ministry of Rehabilitation and Recreation and Shekinah Glory Camp are religious groups established in Louisa County in 2018, Marquardt said. The ministry is a rehabilitation center to help members of the Burmese population with substance abuse problems.

Marquardt said in the past the sheriff’s office has received calls about the site, regarding intoxicated subjects and children being near them.

Fredonia Mayor R. Samuel Braden said the camp is outside Fredonia in rural Louisa County, but the house that contains a parallel operation, also owned by Nuam, was discussed at a city meeting. He said the program has been controversial and many residents had raised concerns. The discussion, he said, had gotten “heated.”

“The issue was brought up whether to renew the permit for them to continue operating the rehab facility or not because it had grown to more than twice the size that we had approved,” Braden said. “Nothing was said about the camp, but it was the same individuals involved. There were a lot of questions about them as individuals.”

Braden said the operation had started small when it was first approved by the city, with fewer than 20 people. According to papers filed with the city, 51 people are in the program. Concerns raised at the meeting are that the facility didn’t have adequate staff to supervise the people there. Some of the people had also been able to procure alcohol, which is what they were there to recover from.

The ministry’s social media page says, “Our prayer is to build a church and a house for 100 people this year 2025.”

Braden said someone from the ministry once broke into someone’s house and started an altercation because he was drunk.

“We have struggled with this for the last four years,” Braden said. “Not specifically about the camp, but about the Burmese population in general. There are racial motivations here. There have been people who wrote racist graffiti in the park telling the Burmese to go home. We have struggled with racism directed at the Burmese and that has clouded a lot of discussion here. There have been legitimate concerns as well in the issues of supervision and maintenance that David may have gotten himself in over his head.”

During the meeting, Nuam also said he had custody of several minors, Braden said.

Fredonia has a large Burmese community — Braden says one of the largest in the state. Originally from Myanmar, formerly called Burma, many had come to Iowa as refugees years ago and some had fallen into alcoholism, which is why the city had originally approved the program.

Marquardt said that because 88 children were involved, the situation had been “overwhelming” for law enforcement.

“Everyone is working as fast as they can — local and state,” he said. “The magnitude of this is pretty extraordinary.”