The Bishop of Leicester’s denial that he accused a stalking victim of ‘witchcraft’ itself raises serious questions about his conduct in the senior pastoral office he holds.

The Church Times on June 30 reported Bishop Martyn Snow’s denial of accusing church volunteer Jay Hulme of witchcraft during an internal investigation into the conduct of a former pioneer lay minister employed by Leicester Diocese, Venessa Pinto.

The story followed a BBC File on 4 investigation into the case, broadcast on Sunday June 29. Mr Hulme, a volunteer welcomer at St Nicholas’s, Leicester, was stalked and harassed by Ms Pinto, then a licensed lay minister in the diocese, over 19 months in 2021 and 2022.

The paper summarised the BBC report of the victim’s meeting with Bishop Snow: ‘Mr Hulme compiled detailed evidence and made a formal complaint to the Church of England in January 2022. An internal church investigation was conducted, which concluded that Ms Pinto had been responsible for the abuse.

‘Mr Hulme was called to a meeting with Bishop Snow, who reportedly came to a different conclusion: that Ms Pinto had not been responsible, that the accusations were not in keeping with her character, and that the Bishop would not be upholding the complaint or revoking her lay licence.

‘Mr Hulme says that the Bishop then accused him of conducting a séance, because “Somebody had given a statement that I had been seen in the church, in the darkness, with a candle,” and because he was friends with a tarot-card reader. “For clarity, I was praying with a candle in the dark, because that’s a thing that Christians do,” Mr Hulme said. The Bishop had then reportedly said that Mr Hulme’s discernment process towards ordination would be “slowed down”.’

Immediately after the BBC investigation, the Diocese of Leicester issued a statement: ‘We wish to make it very clear that Bishop Martyn did not accuse Jay Hulme of practising “witchcraft”. Indeed, he is deeply disturbed that this accusation has been made.

‘He did question Mr Hulme with regard to complaints that had been made against him – complaints which included (in Mr Hulme’s words in the BBC interview) reference to conducting a seance in a church (something he later described as a “joke”) and reference to consulting a friend who is a tarot card reader.

‘The Church of England has never supported such actions and therefore it was entirely appropriate for the bishop to ask about their veracity (given that Mr Hulme is exploring becoming a priest in the Church of England). This is a long way from accusing someone of being a “witch”.’

This denial therefore admits that instead of accepting the conclusions of the internal investigation that Mr Hulme was a victim of abuse by Ms Pinto, Bishop Snow turned the tables on the victim’s alleged conduct. While the Bishop may not have used the precise term ‘witchcraft’ he admits raising allegations that Mr Hulme had engaged in occult practices.

Bishop Snow’s motivation for wanting to protect Ms Pinto, then a General Synod member, is unclear. But it is clear that his initial instinct was to back her or at the very least take a mediating position between the bully and her victim.

The outline of events in the Leicester Diocese statement shows Bishop Snow was shoved off the fence, or out of Ms Pinto’s corner, after separate allegations against her came to light: ‘Although the expert’s report, (received in May 2022) concluded that, on the balance of probabilities, the complaint should be upheld, the bishop did not believe there were sufficient grounds to remove Ms Pinto’s lay ministry licence.

‘He did, however, (on 30 June 2022) ask Ms Pinto to withdraw from ministry concerning her behaviour.

‘On 25 July 2022, new evidence came to light which led the bishop to immediately remove Ms Pinto’s licence and inform other church bodies with which she was involved, including General Synod and the Crown Nominations Commission.’

Ms Pinto’s subsequent prosecution and conviction in 2024 after she pleaded guilty to stalking showed that Bishop Snow made a serious misjudgement in initially overruling the conclusion of the internal Leicester Diocese investigation into the case.

The BBC report pointed out that Bishop Snow is in the running to be the new Archbishop of Canterbury. In November 2024, soon after Justin Welby resigned as Archbishop of Canterbury over the findings of the Church of England’s Makin Review into the savage serial abuses by John Smyth, London’s Evening Standard cited Bishop Snow as a possible successor.

Following this latest scandal, the Crown Nominations Commission, chaired by Britain’s former spy chief Lord (Jonathan) Evans, would surely be very unlikely to nominate Bishop Snow.

If the new Archbishop of Canterbury due to be appointed this autumn (the bookies’ favourite is the Bishop of Chelmsford, Dr Guli Francis-Dehqani) is serious about cleaning up the C of E’s act on safeguarding, the question arises: what kind of conversation might they be minded to have with Bishop Snow over his handling of the Pinto scandal?

Julian Mann, a former Church of England vicar, is an evangelical journalist based in Lancashire, UK.