There’s a really bad mess going on at the 125-year-old Second Baptist Church that involves the church membership, the church leadership, the management of the church’s defunct credit union, the LAPD, and the L.A. County Superior Court and nobody wants to talk about it in front of me. In fact, nobody wants to talk about it at all except the cops. According to the police, they are investigating the disappearance of at least $750,000 from the Second Baptist Church Credit Union when it went out of business last year.

According to documents filed with the Superior Court last month, Addys L. Adams, a member of Second Baptist Church and a shareholder in the SBC Credit Union, is suing the church, its pastor, the Rev. William S. Epps; its credit union, Norman Bullock, the credit union manager; the Canaan Development Corp. and individuals David Crippens, Albert Matthews and Larry Dodge for fraudulent misrepresentation, conversion, financial elder abuse, intentional infliction of emotional distress, invasion of privacy, conspiracy, negligence and breach of fiduciary duties with respect to the credit union’s demise.

At the same time, Second Baptist Church and the SBC Credit Union is suing Bullock and the Canaan Development Group for fraudulent misrepresentation, unjust enrichment and breach of fiduciary duty of good faith and fair dealing. But wait a minute now, you have to read this: In a cross complaint, the Canaan Development Corp. is suing Bullock, Rev. Epps, as pastor of the church and president of the credit union, as well as suing the church and the credit union for the same offenses the church and credit union are suing them.

I have had copies of these lawsuits for some time and I’ve made numerous calls to the lawyers involved seeking information about and a better understanding of their contents and contentions. None of my calls have been returned. I have received communication about the situation from what I perceive to be an anti-Epps faction, but a pro-Epps faction — if there is one — has been silent. I learned from the anti-Epps forces that the pastor had called a church meeting last Sunday after the 11 a.m. service and I was urged to attend. As I was anxious to hear what Epps and other members of his church had to say about these lawsuits, and as I wanted to gauge the level of support the pastor had, I got up early Sunday morning and drove 50 miles to and from the meeting, which was attended by 159 people. It would have been 160, but Epps put me out. Yeah, I was mad because I went out of my way to give him the benefit of the doubt because I like his preaching.

I went there looking for balance, since I only had one point of view, and I left there having learned nothing. But early Monday morning the anti-Epps faction e-mailed me a report of the meeting from which I had been ejected, which read as follows: “At the end of the meeting, the president of the Trustee Board made a motion to have Pastor Epps removed. It was seconded, but Pastor Epps blocked the vote and immediately went to adjournment. God help us!!!!!” Pastor Epps should have left with me.

STILL A WINNER — Admiral David L. Brewer, our LAUSD superintendent who was fired from his post and run out of town by Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and his handmaiden, school board President Monica Garcia, et al., and replaced by conflict-of-interest operative Ramon Cortines, was voted onto the national board of Everybody Wins, a national literacy and mentoring organization that builds skills for reading and academic achievement among low income elementary school students. Everybody Wins, with which the late Sen. Ted Kennedy participated until his death, was recently cited by the White House as an “innovative and successful community solution by pairing volunteer mentors with children for consistent weekly one-on-one reading experiences over the school year.” Congratulations, Superintendent Brewer.

By the way, remember how the school board paid Brewer a jaw-dropping sum to vacate his job here even though he had only worked half his contracted tenure? Well, Brewer told me a while back that our impoverished school district offered him even more money — more money than God — to give up his superintendent job, but he declined the additional money. He said the contract buy-out offer kept going up and up, but he settled for the lesser large sum he received because he felt the larger amounts they were throwing at him were obscene, excessive and unnecessary. It was clear that Villaraigosa and them wanted Brewer gone at any cost.

SOME MORE DEBUNKING — To those red soda water drinkers who insist that President Barack Obama is doing nothing to help Black people in this country, I say this to them: Earlier this month, the Department of Energy awarded $9 million in grants to science and technical research to Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) in South Carolina and Georgia. The funds are to be used to develop academic programs that promote minority involvement in science and technical research fields, to help the Department of Energy achieve its mission of attaining a more diversified workforce and are part of the Obama administration’s commitment to investing in science and math education. The nine HBCUs selected for the grants are located near the Savannah River area because many of the Energy Department scientists and technicians who work nearby are aged and nearing retirement and will need to be replaced — hopefully with young, newly minted Black scientists and technicians.

THIS AND THAT — In a growing swell of repudiation of Inglewood’s leadership, high-level employees are beginning to abandon that ship. First Jeff Muir, the city’s finance officer quit. Then Rick Longobart, head of Inglewood’s Fleet Department quit and now Mary Beth Allen, the head of Inglewood’s Human Resources Department has resigned. But they say she wasn’t any good anyway.

Los Angeles City Councilwoman Janice Hahn was honored recently by another city council — the Carson City Council — for her “outstanding leadership in gang violence prevention.” Assemblyman Mike Davis also honored her for her gang curtailment efforts. … The Jenesse Center saluted Supervisor Mark Ridley-Thomas and his wife, Avis, Sunday for their efforts in preventing domestic violence. The Ridley-Thomases were Jenesse’s 30th annual Silver Rose awardees and were honored during fundraising festivities at the Beverly Hills Hotel which were chaired by actress Halle Berry.

In the 161 years the University of Notre Dame has been it awarding degrees, it has never had an African American as valedictorian — until this year. Katie Washington of Gary, Ind., has been named valedictorian of the 2010 Notre Dame graduating class and will deliver the valedictory address during commencement exercises on May 16 in Notre Dame Stadium. She will be the first African-American to do so. She is a biological sciences major with a 4.0 GPA with plans of pursuing a joint M.D./Ph.D program at Johns Hopkins University when she graduates from Notre Dame.

AND FINALLY — My sources tell me that Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa’s girlfriend, KTLA news reporter Lu Parker, has been living in the Getty mansion, the mayor’s official residence, for the past two months. Her car, parked in the driveway of the taxpayer-provided residence, has been under surveillance by the prying eyes I love so much. They say Parker is seen at the Irving Boulevard residence every day and that she arrives there each night after work between 11 p.m. and 1 a.m. I don’t think I should have to pay for that.