the District Attorney decided to drop the case. Parham and his supporters insisted that the charges had been false, and were part of an attempt by Wilbur Voliva to frame him. Parham had previously stopped preaching at Voliva's Zion City church in order to set up his Apostolic Faith Movement. However, Parham's opponents used the episode to discredit both Parham and his religious movement. Posters with a supposed confession by Parham of sodomy were distributed to towns where he was preaching, years after the case against him was dropped. Parham was never able to recover from the stigma that had attached itself to his ministry, and his influence waned. In addition there were allegations of financial irregularity and of doctrinal aberrations. In the aftermath of these events his large support base in Zion descended into a Salem-like frenzy of insanity, eventually killing three of their members in brutal exorcisms. Members of the group, who included John G Lake and Fred Bosworth, were forced to flee from Illinois, and scattered across America. As the focus of the movement moved from Parham to Seymour, Parham became resentful. His attacks on emerging leaders coupled with the allegations alienated him from much of the movement that he began. He became "an embarrassment" to a new movement which was trying to establish its credibility. Death As a boy, Parham had contracted a severe rheumatic fever which damaged his heart and contributed to his poor health. At one time he almost died. Parham recovered to an active preaching life, strongly believing that God was his healer. While he recovered from the rheumatic fever, it appears the disease probably weakened his heart muscles and was a contributing factor to his later heart problems and early death. By 1927 early symptoms of heart problems were beginning to appear, and by the fall and summer of 1928, after returning from a trip to Palestine (which had been a lifetime desire), Parham's health began to further deteriorate. In early January 1929, Parham took a long car ride with two friends to Temple, Texas, where he was to be presenting his pictures of Palestine. On January 5, he collapsed while showing his slides. When his wife arrived, she found out that his heart was bad, and he was unable to eat. Against his wishes (he wanted to continue his preaching tour), his family brought him home to Baxter Springs, Kansas, where