Leader of church that marketed and sold bleach as COVID cure extradited to Miami from Colombia

Father, sons founded Genesis II Church of Health and Healing as ‘non-religious’ church to sell ‘miracle’ solution

Their church wasn’t about religion. The donations they sought were mandatory. And taking the chemical they marketed and sold as a cure for COVID-19 and other illnesses is the equivalent of drinking bleach.

Mark Grenon and his three sons — Jonathan Grenon, Jordan Grenon and Joseph Grenon — founded Genesis II Church of Health and Healing, what they called a “non-religious church,” in order to sell their “Miracle Mineral Solution” to the masses, court records say.

Mark Grenon, 64, was extradited to the United States from Colombia and made his first appearance in a Miami federal court Thursday, prosecutors said. He now joins his three sons as inmates at the federal detention center in Miami.

Grenon and his sons were indicted last year on one count each of conspiracy to commit fraud and two counts each of criminal contempt.

The Grenons’ scheme went on for a decade, according to a criminal complaint. Before they marketed the chemical as a COVID cure, they claimed it could treat, prevent and cure Alzheimer’s disease, autism, malaria, Parkinson’s, multiple sclerosis and HIV/AIDS.

They sold thousands of bottles of the liquid to people across the country, including some in South Florida, the complaint says. In one year alone, their profits amounted to $500,000.

But ingesting the chemical as the Grenons instructed is the equivalent of drinking bleach, court records say. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration said in 2019 that the solution had not been approved for any use and that there had been numerous reports of people being hospitalized, having life-threatening conditions or dying after taking Miracle Mineral

Solution.

Early in the pandemic, Mark and Joseph hosted a weekly podcast where they talked about the chemical’s healing powers, the complaint says, and promoted it as a treatment for COVID. Their March 8, 2020, episode was titled: “The Coronavirus is curable! Do you believe it? You better!”

And people did. The Grenons received about $123,000 in revenue that month, an increase of nearly 400% in sales, the complaint says.

Genesis II Church of Health and Healing was a way to shirk legal responsibility, Mark admitted in an interview in February 2020.

“You can’t arrest us from doing one of our sacraments, and I knew this. So that’s why ... I said let’s do a church. We could have done temple. We could have done synagogue. We could have done mosque,” Mark said in the interview when asked why he founded Genesis, the complaint says.

People could purchase the chemical on various websites with the church’s name, the complaint says, by giving donations.

But the dollar amounts were set and mandatory, “such that the ‘donation’ amounts were effectively just sale prices.”

Investigators found that the Grenons were manufacturing the chemical in a shed in the backyard of Jonathan’s home in Bradenton on Florida’s west coast.

The criminal contempt charges they are facing came after a Miami federal judge ordered the church to stop selling the substance in 2020, but the order was ignored.

After the judge’s order, Mark wrote a letter to the judge on behalf of the four.

“We are practicing ‘civil disobedience’ against this unjust order! … NOTE: The 2nd Amendment is there in case it can’t be done peaceably … The Genesis II Church of Health and Healing will not stop . . . providing [MMS] to the world!”

Joseph and Mark on another podcast episode threatened to “pick up guns” and instigate “a Waco” if the government interfered, court records say.