This column contains spoilers of "Death of the Pastor’s Wife" and mentions domestic violence, abuse and suicide. If you or someone you know needs mental health resources and support, please call, text or chat with the 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline or visit 988lifeline.org for 24/7 access to free and confidential services.
In April 2024, Mica Miller, a pastor's wife, was found dead, face down in a river, 100 feet from shell casings at a state park in North Carolina. A 911 call recorded the 30-year-old saying she was going to commit suicide and she wanted her family to know where to find her. Her death was ruled a suicide and her body quickly cremated.
But her friends and family who had been following her harrowing journey from worship leader to
pastor's wife to victim of domestic violence knew something didn't add up. Mica had filed for divorce two days earlier and was excited and relieved to have a fresh start. Her loved ones believed then, as they do now, that her estranged husband, a pastor named John-Paul Miller, or JP, had something to do with her death. That is the vantage point of Netflix's latest docuseries “Death of the Pastor’s Wife,” currently the platform’s most-watched title.
Mica's community rallied when she died, and now the release of this docuseries has prompted another visceral response. On Aug. 30, protesters stood outside Mercy Church, where JP preaches in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, still outraged over her death two years ago. No charges have been filed related to Mica's death, but federal prosecutors have charged the pastor with cyberstalking and making false statements to investigators; his trial is slated for October.
I was skeptical of this series at first. Netflix's previous shows on abuse and violence often let the worst people manipulate us, humanized killers or given us clickbait. But my cynicism was replaced with disgust, clarity and renewed hope for victims of abuse and their loved ones trying to understand it.
"Death of the Pastor's Wife" offers an intricate look at how abuse and coercive control feel to victims, especially within religious circles. It shows how a dysfunctional, dangerous dynamic that weaponizes faith can fool everyone for a while, even the victim herself.
Mica Miller's death was a tragedy
Like most victims of domestic abuse, Mica's story didn’t start with abuse, stalking or control, but with charm, love, promises and sex. According to the docuseries, Mica met JP, 15 years her senior, when she was just 13; by 16 she was the worship leader at his church and then later his administrative assistant.
While both were married, JP pursued a relationship with her and an affair followed in 2015. After both divorced their spouses, the two married each other, and the patterns of domestic violence began.
Through interviews with friends and family, Mica’s journals and text messages, police reports and video of JP’s sermons, viewers get an inside look at coercive control, a form of abuse that includes tactics like isolation, bullying, stalking, intimidation and restricting access to funds, family, friends or medical care. According to the docuseries, JP treated Mica like a sex slave, sometimes denying her sleep until they’d had sex several times in a day and forcing her into unwanted sexual acts with others. He stalked her physically and online, escalating when she tried to leave.
“The broad thing that JP was doing was trying to strip away her freedom, her independence, her self-esteem,” executive producer Alana Goldstein told Tudum. “Not through one single event, but through years and years of continuous micro-events that trapped her in a state of dependence on him.”
Mica's journal entries show she struggled with the way JP was treating her. But rather than seeing his poor treatment as abuse, she questioned her own worth and appealed to her Christian faith because JP was also her pastor. Abusers often target people of faith: Christianity’s emphasis on forgiveness and grace gives them something to exploit.
Abuse can be subtle and dangerous, but there's hope
By focusing on Mica's experience over JP’s, the docuseries lets viewers see abuse through a victim's eyes, and recognize the red flags abusers display.
Like many abusers, JP shows signs of narcissism, but not in the way Hollywood has trained us to expect. Abusers are often portrayed as Hannibal Lecter-type psychopaths, or as loud and obviously violent. That can be true, of course, but many abusers are charming and disarming at first, then turn manipulative, threatening, intimidating and skilled at playing the victim.
In one scene, JP drops the mask of the charming pastor, has a breakdown and is filmed lying down on the grass sobbing. This temper tantrum is a manipulation tactic to shift the focus from Mica's pain to his distress. Victimhood is a common tactic for abusers, because it seems counterintuitive and confusing to the real victims.
Finally, the series shows how the law hasn’t caught up with this kind of abuse. Mica repeatedly appealed to law enforcement for help. Her family is pushing to pass Mica's Law, which would criminalize coercive control and add psychological, emotional and financial abuse to South Carolina's definition of domestic violence. Law enforcement would also be trained to identify traits of coercive control.
So far, the proposal hasn't passed in South Carolina.
The Marshall Project reports that at least six states have passed similar laws since 2020, and more are pending.
"Death of a Pastor's Wife" is nauseating and infuriating to watch, but it offers an accurate glimpse into the often unseen world of coercive control and domestic violence. Awareness of what Mica Miller endured won't undo what happened to her. But it might be its own small measure of justice.
Nicole Russell is an opinion columnist with USA TODAY. She lives in Texas with her four kids. Sign up for her newsletter, The Right Track, and get it delivered to your inbox.
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Mica Miller deserves justice. This Netflix series is a start. | Opinion
