Robert Tilton turned a struggling local church broadcast into an $80 million-a-year televangelism machine by reverse-engineering the late-night direct-response infomercial. After a trip to Hawaii exposed him to real estate pitchman Dave Del Dotto, he secured a $1.3 million loan, launched the daily program Success and Life, and preached a prosperity theology that promised supernatural wealth and healing in exchange for donations, especially a stressed $1,000 vow.

This episode traces how watchdog Ole Anthony and the Trinity Foundation exposed the operation, from hidden-camera footage inside a Tulsa mail firm to 30 days of dumpster diving that uncovered discarded prayer letters with the cash stripped out. We follow the 1991 ABC Primetime Live report, Tilton's bizarre magical-ink defense, the collapse of his ministry, and his later online comeb ...