Lloyd Evans's Blog

Jehovah’s Witnesses and the United Nations – 20 Years Later

By Tim Creek

On October 8, 2001, people were shocked to learn that the Watchtower Bible and Tract Society of New York had a nine-year affiliation with the United Nations as a Non-Governmental Organization. This reaction was due to Jehovah’s Witnesses’ long history of excoriating the UN in its publications, videos, and talks. The article in The Guardian that uncovered this can still be read at the link below:

https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2001/oct/08/religion.world

In short, Watchtower was actively associated as a UN NGO for nearly a decade, from February 1992 until October 2001, until the very day after the newspaper article was published, at which time Watchtower requested termination of its association as a UN NGO.

The UN’s responses in 2001 and 2004[1] to the hundreds of inquiries seeking confirmation of this relationship can be located online, as well as Watchtower’s flimsy excuse for seeking affiliation in order to obtain a library card. This article provides a historical review of (i) what Watchtower’s NGO affiliation entailed, (ii) how Watchtower may have endeavored to meet its obligations to the UN, and (iii) how Watchtower portrayed itself to Jehovah’s Witnesses at the time it was an NGO.

Implications of Watch Tower’s Affiliation with the UN

As stated in the March 4, 2004 letter from the UN, the purpose of association as a UN NGO is for the “redissemination of information in order to increase public understanding of the principles, activities, and achievements of the United Nations and its Agencies.” Clearly, Watchtower can meet this criterion as a publishing company with a global audience

An additional criterion to becoming a UN NGO is that the NGO must “share the principles of the UN Charter.” This is interesting since, as many know, Watchtower has denounced the UN in its publications for decades.

One example of Watchtower’s description of the UN prior to it becoming a UN NGO is contained in The Watchtower, September 15, 1984, p. 15:

The UN really stands in the way of God’s Kingdom by the “seed” of Abraham. Hence, it is the present-day “disgusting thing that causes desolation.” ( Matthew 24:15 ) No, the UN is not a blessing, even though the religious clergy of Christendom and the rabbis of Jewry pray heaven’s blessing upon that organization. It is really “the image of the wild beast,” the visible political, commercial organization of “the god of this system of things,” Satan the Devil. So the UN will soon be destroyed along with that beastly organization.

How Did Watchtower Meet Its Obligations as a UN NGO?

Notably, once Jehovah’s Witnesses had applied to become a UN NGO, their treatment of the UN in their literature shifted dramatically. Consider a sampling of Watchtower publications from the time when Watchtower sought association with the UN in 1991, and notice whether the tone of Watchtower’s treatment of the UN changed from what it was in 1984:

Awake!, September 8, 1991, pp. 9, 10

The preamble to the United Nations Charter expresses these noble aims: “We the peoples of the United Nations determined to save succeeding generations from the scourge of war, which twice in our lifetime has brought untold sorrow to mankind, . . . and [desiring] to unite our strength to maintain international peace and security, . . . have resolved to combine our efforts to accomplish these aims.”

Did the UN “accomplish these aims”? Did it get the nations to unite their strength and maintain peace and security? No, not so far, although the UN has sincerely tried to be a significantly better way than the League of Nations. However, the generation that saw its establishment in 1945 has since been scourged by wars, revolutions, invasions, coups, and aggression in many parts of the earth. And this violence involved many of the nations that had resolved to “maintain international peace and security.”

Jehovah’s Witnesses firmly believe that the United Nations is going to play a major role in world events in the very near future. No doubt these developments will be very exciting. And the results will have a far-reaching impact on your life. We urge you to ask Jehovah’s Witnesses in your neighborhood for more details on this matter. The Bible clearly paints a picture showing that the United Nations will very shortly be given power and authority. The UN will then do some very astonishing things that may well amaze you. And you will be thrilled to learn that there is yet a better way near at hand that will surely bring eternal peace and security!

Readers of this misleading text may conclude that future UN actions will bear fruit and directly bring about improved world conditions, with Watchtower plainly stating that the UN’s efforts to bring peace and security have not succeeded “so far.” It also praised future UN efforts as being “very exciting,” having “a far-reaching impact on your life,” with the UN doing “some very astonishing things that may well amaze you.” While Watchtower might justify these statements by bending them to fit its predictions of UN actions on the world scene, these comments intimate support for such UN activity, rather than denunciation of them as the fruitless actions of an enemy of God’s Kingdom. Consider another example of how Jehovah’s Witnesses portrayed the UN while it was a UN NGO:

The Watchtower, October 1, 1995, pp. 3, 4

For 50 years the United Nations organization has made notable efforts to bring about world peace and security. Arguably, it may have prevented a third world war, and the wholesale destruction of human life through the use of nuclear bombs has not been repeated. The United Nations has provided millions of children with food and medicine. It has contributed to improved health standards in many countries, providing, among other things, safer drinking water and immunization against dangerous diseases. Millions of refugees have received humanitarian assistance.

In recognition of its accomplishments, the United Nations organization has been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize five times. Yet, the lamentable fact of life is that we still do not live in a world without war.

As shown, Watchtower’s characterization of the UN changed from “the disgusting thing that causes desolation” in 1984, to “noble” in 1991, to lauding its accomplishments in 1995. Unbeknownst to Witnesses at the time, this change likely occurred in order for Watchtower to fulfill its obligations as a UN NGO to disseminate information about UN activities, which it did by publishing articles painting the UN in a favorable light.

How Watchtower Portrayed Itself to Jehovah’s Witnesses

In 1993, not long after becoming affiliated as a UN NGO, Watchtower published the book Jehovah’s Witnesses – Proclaimers of God’s Kingdom. Notice how Watchtower described the history of the UN’s establishment, the involvement of Christendom’s leaders at that time, and how Watchtower remained neutral. Bear in mind that the primary audience of the Proclaimers book was Witnesses, not the general public.

Jehovah’s Witnesses – Proclaimers of God’s Kingdom, pp. 192-193

While World War II was still underway, in 1942, Jehovah’s Witnesses had already discerned from the Bible, at  Revelation 17:8 , that the world peace organization would rise again, also that it would fail to bring lasting peace. This was explained by N. H. Knorr, then president of the Watch Tower Society, in the convention discourse “Peace—Can It Last?” Boldly Jehovah’s Witnesses proclaimed that view of the developing world situation. On the other hand, Catholic, Protestant, and Jewish leaders actually shared in the deliberations in San Francisco in 1945 during which the UN Charter was drafted. To observers of these developments, it was plain who wanted to be “a friend of the world” and who was endeavoring to be “no part of the world,” as Jesus had said would be true of his disciples.

One cannot overemphasize the fact that the preceding text was published in 1993, while Watchtower was a UN NGO. Jehovah’s Witnesses blatantly lied to its members – sanctimoniously condemning other religions as being “a friend of the world” while falsely declaring itself “no part of the world” at the very time that it was a UN NGO. Yet, in the publications it distributed to the public quoted previously, its portrayal of the UN was very complimentary, not condemnatory.

What It All Means

Most would find it astonishing that Watchtower, who claims to be God’s one true religion and spirit-directed by Jehovah, would voluntarily seek association with the UN, a supposed part of Satan’s political and commercial machine in opposition to Jehovah – and then lie in print that it was “no part of the world” during such affiliation. For anyone who has ever faced the decision of attending a funeral of a family member in a church, Watchtower’s secret affiliation with the UN is deeply disturbing. It’s highly hypocritical for Jehovah’s Witnesses to shout “get out of Babylon the Great!” to individual Witnesses when the religious organization itself had voluntarily applied for and was granted affiliation with the image of the wild beast upon which the religious harlot is riding. According to Watchtower rules applicable to individual Witnesses (contained in the Shepherd the Flock of God elders’ manual), didn’t Watchtower paradoxically disassociate itself by “joining a nonneutral organization”?

Now approaching twenty years since coming to light, one can only speculate as to what would have prompted this affiliation. Perhaps it was to curry approval with the global political community in the face of tax-exemption and charitable status headwinds at the time or to ease restrictions on proselytizing in various countries. Whatever the case, the very thing for which Watchtower has frequently denounced Christendom – spiritual fornication with the kings of the Earth – is applicable to Watchtower. Jehovah’s Witnesses can hardly claim to be following Jesus’ counsel to true Christians to remain “no part of the world” and to speak the truth.

This is as shocking today as it was in 2001.

[1] https://web.archive.org/web/20160808122118/http://ask.un.org/loader.php?fid=714&type=1&key=98fd5be823c972e94733f7fd50f6088d

Article Contribution by Tim Creek

The post Jehovah’s Witnesses and the United Nations – 20 Years Later appeared first on JW Watch.

Watchtower Defies Court Order; Montana Judge Fines and Sanctions Jehovah’s Witnesses

“The Court concludes that Watchtower has been deliberate in its violations of the Court’s orders, and the Plaintiffs’ right to discovery. Its claims that it could not understand the plain language in the Court’s orders are absurd and frivolous. Its decision to obstruct has wasted many hours of scarce time and resources for the Plaintiffs, and for the Court itself, and has prevented Nunez from preparing for trial, which is obviously Watchtower’s intent.”

-Judge Elizabeth Best, Montana Seventh Judicial District Court, July 22nd, 2021

On July 22nd, 2021, Montana Judge Elizabeth Best ordered a combination of fines and sanctions against the Watchtower Bible and Tract Society of New York, a corporation operated by Jehovah’s Witnesses since 1909.

According to the 9-page order issued by Judge Best, Jehovah’s Witnesses must pay $11,075 in legal fees along with a $500 per day fine for each day it violates the orders of the court to produce critical documents in the Nunez v. Watchtower civil case. The court ruled that Watchtower has been intentionally obstructive in their defiance of orders from May 28th and June 23rd of this year, and must retroactively pay the daily fine until it complies with the order.

As an additional penalty against the Jehovah’s Witness defendants, Judge Best ruled that Watchtower and the Christian Congregation of Jehovah’s Witnesses (CCJW) are “prohibited from arguing, making innuendo, mentioning, offering evidence of any “advice of counsel” defense, and from offering any evidence about the advice their attorneys gave them at any time before trial.”

This order is directly related to documents that were privately shared by Watchtower in Judge Manley’s chambers during the 2018 trial in Thompson Falls.

Why was Watchtower Fined? A Brief Case History

In 2016, Lexi Nunez filed a civil lawsuit against Jehovah’s Witnesses for Negligence Per Se, arguing that church elders and their parent corporation, Watchtower, violated Montana’s mandatory child abuse reporting laws. Elders in Thompson Falls claimed they were advised by Watchtower’s New York Legal Department that they had no legal obligation to report Lexi’s step-grandfather, Max Reyes, when they learned that he had abused Lexi’s aunt Holly and uncle Peter.

By preventing church elders from contacting law enforcement, Nunez was subjected to continued abuse by Reyes, despite the fact that the church had disfellowshipped Reyes for over a year.

The case went to trial in September 2018. Judge James Manley ruled prior to trial that the Jehovah’s Witnesses had violated Montana’s statutory reporting code, and the jury was instructed to determine whether the defendants acted with malice. The jury found the defendants guilty, assessing a total of $35 million dollars as a civil award to Nunez.

In January of 2020, the Montana Supreme Court, while sympathetic to Nunez, ruled that Watchtower had successfully navigated a loophole in the mandatory reporting act. The Court decreed that while the facts of the case were disturbing, the Jehovah’s Witness elders were acting according to their “established church practice” when they sealed off reports about the abuser, Max Reyes. Thus, the 2018 judgment was reversed.

Soon after the reversal, Nunez refiled an amended complaint, arguing that while statutory negligence was off the table, she could still argue common law negligence, which is independent of the issue of mandatory reporting. In other words, Nunez wanted her opportunity to demonstrate that Watchtower and the Thompson Falls elders were negligent on their own merits, after learning of Max Reyes’s propensity for abusing children.

The Court agreed and permitted Nunez to proceed on her assertions of common law negligence.

On April 16th, 2021, the case took a dramatic turn when attorneys for Nunez filed a motion to compel the Jehovah’s Witnesses to turn over documents that were revealed in Judge Manley’s chambers on September 23rd, 2018, the night before closing arguments in the original trial.

Watchtower attorney Joel Taylor produced several pages of documents from a CM (Child Maltreatment) telephone log in an effort to persuade Judge Manley that Watchtower was justified in arguing lack of malice by congregation elders – because those pages purportedly revealed a good faith effort by elders to seek legal advice.

Later that evening, Taylor emailed Nunez’s attorneys just three of ten pages that resembled a case file on Max Reyes.

Those pages tipped off attorneys for Nunez that there was something more ominous lurking beneath the “telephonic log.” It was clear that a database of child abusers and victims is a tool used by Jehovah’s Witnesses in the management of their global religious organization.

This legal strategy proved to be a monumental challenge for Watchtower, as they never expected a second trial and the document discovery that would follow.

Hence, Nunez initiated discovery this year on all 10 pages, along with any supplemental information related to a Child Abuse/Maltreatment database.

As reported by JW Watch on April 30th, those documents suggest the extent of data collected by Jehovah’s Witnesses about child abusers and their victims.

April 16th, 2021 Request for Production of Documents

The April 16th motion to compel production of these documents launched a substantial legal battle between Nunez and Watchtower that has led to the disclosure that even more documents exist about the Nunez case. Watchtower insists that these documents are irrelevant and privileged and should not be disclosed to the Plaintiff.

Judge Elizabeth Best, assigned to the 2022 trial, disagrees.

On May 26th, 2021, Judge Best issued an 11-page order compelling production of all documents sought by Nunez, and chastised Watchtower for its abuse of the discovery process. Nunez’s attorneys had argued that Taylor could not selectively turn over 3 of 10 pages to the plaintiff at the 2018 trial, then claim attorney-client privilege on the other 7 pages.

On page 9 of the Order, the Court stated: “Defendants’ attempt, now, to obstruct disclosure of the entire document, which on the face of the previously disclosed three pages constitutes attorney-client communications and legal advice, by cloaking it as “privileged,” is, at best, disingenuous. Defendants may not cherry pick portions of documents for which they waive privilege because it works to their strategic advantage, while withholding other parts because it does not. Defendants have clearly waived any claim of privilege.”

The Judge also addressed Watchtower’s continued claims that the documents do not form a part of any database of information.

She continues:

“Defendants object that the discovery request is “vague and ambiguous,” representing that they do not know what the words “CM Database” mean. The Court finds this objection to be frivolous and interposed for an improper purpose. It is clear to the Court that the Defendants understand what the Plaintiff is seeking, regardless of whether they choose to call the information sought something different. The Defendants’ counsel discussed the “CM Database” with the Court during the Rule 16 conference, which led to the Court’s scheduling order, and never objected that they did not understand the term.”

Judge Best concluded her Order by advising Watchtower that the Court “will not tolerate further obstruction and will consider sanctions for similar conduct in the future”

Watchtower continued to defy the judge, and instead of producing the 10 pages to Nunez, they delayed the process further by submitting the pages to the Court itself for in camera review. (Inspection by judge)

On June 17th, 2021, Judge Best issued yet another court order, this time compelling production of the documents and issuing legal and financial penalties to Watchtower for their obstruction. In her 8-page order, the judge condemned Watchtower’s behavior and fined the religious organization all costs and attorneys fees associated with their motion to compel document production. The legal fees alone were $11,075.00.

Meanwhile, prior to the June 17th Order, Watchtower had complicated their case even further by submitting a supplemental privilege log to the court, a document that disclosed the existence of 22 new pages of documents previously unknown to Nunez. Many of the records concern legal advice provided to the Polson Montana congregation when elders conferred with Watchtower about Peter McGowan. As previously reported by JW Watch, Peter was not only a victim of Max Reyes, he was also responsible for years of sexual abuse of his own niece, Lexi.

The existence of these documents raises serious questions about why this information was not turned over to Nunez’s attorneys in 2018. Watchtower’s position is that they are irrelevant to the case, and protected.

The Harshest of All Judgments

Finally, on July 22nd, 2021 the Montana Court imposed what might be one of the severest censures of a defendant and counsel in Montana history. The following is an excerpt from the Judge’s order:

“This Court issued Orders on May 28, 2021 (Doc. 210) and on June 23, 2021 (Doc. 214) in which it set forth relevant law on discovery and its expectations of all parties during discovery. The May 28, 2021, Order compelled production of certain specific documents by Watchtower. Watchtower not only flouted its disobedience of that Order, in subsequent pleadings it asserted that an order issued by Judge Manley (Doc. 116) was the “law of the case” and that, therefore, it is “confused” about this Court’s orders, and seeks “guidance” before producing documents the Court has ordered produced. The Court finds Watchtower’s arguments to be frivolous and specious, interposed solely to obstruct and delay.“

“Based on the Court’s review of Watchtower’s documents submitted for in camera review, the Court immediately recognized Watchtower’s obstruction and issued another Order, this time assessing sanctions. (Doc. 214). Watchtower defied that Order and continues to refuse to produce 22 pages of documents, and unabashedly misrepresents the truth. As to documents the Court expressly ordered it to produce, Watchtower asserts that it complied and is simply waiting for the Court to address its embellished claims of privilege, and its “confusion” and its claim that a previous order issued by Judge Manley, before the first trial, supersedes this Court’s Orders.”

“Watchtower’s representations raise other very serious concerns about its candor with the Court from the outset. Before the Court’s first Order of May 28, 2021, counsel Joel Taylor (Taylor), on behalf of Watchtower, signed and filed an affidavit1 in which he represented, inter alia, that the fourth page of one document at issue “contains no information.” The document, later reluctantly produced, contains information about Max Reyes abusing Peter McGowan, and notably contains blank spaces in response to a question, “Efforts to protect the victim?” which is obviously potentially probative of Nunez’s claims of breach of a duty to protect minors. Failure to answer such a question is, actually, “information,” which is apparent to any competent lawyer.”

“Likewise, Watchtower initially opposed the Motion to Compel by representing that withheld documents were “unrelated” to previously disclosed documents, and Taylor attested to the truth of this representation in his affidavit. It is clear that this representation was false. Documents 1a and 1b relate to Max’s abuse of Peter and Holly beginning in 1994.2 Watchtower pretended, in its initial briefing, not to understand the term, “database.” It turns out, from the few documents now produced, that they were indeed part of an “electronic database” -in Watchtower’s own words.“

“Nunez’s discovery requests were based on an email from Watchtower lawyer Taylor, in which he described them as “the other 7 pages involve Peter/Alexis” and “the remaining pages involve Peter Jr. ‘s confession [to] the Polson Congregation regarding his abuse of Alexis.”

Watchtower’s defiance is breathtaking and must, as the Montana Supreme Court has often said, not be dealt with leniently.

Judge Elizabeth best

“After the Court’s first order to produce the documents, Watchtower produced only seven pages of documents, none of which relate to Peter abusing Alexis. Rather, the produced documents relate to evidence already known to Nunez, the abuse of Peter, Holly, and Alexis by Max Reyes. The missing pages regarding Peter’s abuse of Alexis have not been produced at all. In sum, then, Watchtower has misrepresented to the Court that it has even partially complied with the Court’s Order.”

“On June 11, 2021 (after the May 28, 2021, Order), Watchtower identified an additional 22 pages of documents that had, until that date, never been disclosed to Nunez or the Court. Simultaneously, it filed a new and improved privilege log listing documents in random order, many of which clearly refer to evidence of Peter abusing Alexis, which the Court had ordered produced. Appallingly, Watchtower continues to withhold documents about Peter’s abuse of Alexis, and appears to be attempting a sleight of hand by offering a modified privilege log.”

“Watchtower has reasserted its claims of privilege, ignored the Court’s Order overruling those claims, asserted “confusion” and lack of understanding of the Orders [asserting that it does not “understand” whether the Court’s Orders apply to congregations, even though they briefed that very issue and claimed privilege for congregations starting in February 2021], and simultaneously inconsistently asked the Court to alter or amend Orders which it feigns not to understand. These arguments are frivolous, neither based on fact or law, and will not be tolerated, as the Court has previously warned. Watchtower’s defiance is breathtaking and must, as the Montana Supreme Court has often said, not be dealt with leniently. Instead, courts are instructed to “intently punish transgressors rather than patiently encouraging their cooperation.””

“The Court concludes that Watchtower has been deliberate in its violations of the Court’s orders, and the Plaintiffs’ right to discovery. Its claims that it could not understand the plain language in the Court’s orders are absurd and frivolous. Its decision to obstruct has wasted many hours of scarce time and resources for the Plaintiffs, and for the Court itself, and has prevented Nunez from preparing for trial, which is obviously Watchtower’s intent. Every time a party chooses attrition and stonewalling, not only the opposing party in the case involved, but parties in numerous other cases lose opportunities to exercise their fundamental right to access to the Courts.” [highlighted areas by JW Watch]

The conduct and actions of Watchtower’s legal team are so serious that Judge Best warned the Jehovah’s Witnesses that such violations of court orders could lead to an order of judgment by default, where the defendants would lose the case without ever facing a jury. This could potentially cost Watchtower millions, if not tens of millions of dollars. In 2015, a California court awarded a judgment by default against Watchtower for similar violations of the discovery process.

After losing appeals to the California and U.S. Supreme Courts, Watchtower paid more than 6 million dollars to the victim in judgment and interest.

Montana Judge Elizabeth Best concluded her Order by enumerating both financial and legal sanctions against Watchtower. Aside from the economic penalties, Watchtower will be barred from offering evidence that elders relied upon “advice of counsel” as a defense, or that they believed they were complying with the law when they failed to protect Lexi Nunez from the sexual abuse by Max Reyes.

As of the date of this article, Watchtower continues in contempt of the court’s orders and has not provided Nunez any further documents.

Documents:

July 22nd Order Assessing Sanctions and Attorneys Fees

June 23rd Order Compelling Production and Sanctions

May 28th Order Compelling Production

The post Watchtower Defies Court Order; Montana Judge Fines and Sanctions Jehovah’s Witnesses appeared first on JW Watch.

Marking – a loving provision?

The well-worn phrases which suggest that Jehovah will bless the efforts of devout witnesses don’t bear scrutiny. Dig deep and you’ll find that the small pool of blessings on offer not only come with strings attached but can also be found by secular means.
So, whilst the carrots on offer are few, the sticks aren’t.

The ultimate stick being used by Watchtower is shunning; a self-serving and contrived punishment, reserved for those who have left the organisation, either by choice or by expulsion. It’s cruel, damaging and in a few cases, lethal.

Marking or ‘disfellowshipping lite’, neatly fills the gap where punishment can be meted out when the offence isn’t sufficient for expulsion but justice, in the eyes of the congregation, has to be seen to be done.

This form of punishment is reserved for offences where disfellowshipping can’t be used but where at least some, if not most, of the congregation is aware of the offence. It takes the form of a talk, usually shortly after general gossip of the “sinner” around the congregation, titillating the small minded and embarrasses the offender.

Marking, as Watchtower undoubtedly realises, is not only a marvellous way of humiliating members, but a means of inducing dread in those in attendance. It’s the stick that keeps on giving and a win-win for the organisation – and here’s where it really keeps on giving.

The mortified recipient of this loving arrangement has now to suffer being snubbed by his family and friends.

Personal Experiences

The Reddit post which prompted this article related the personal experiences of many who had been marked and the results it had on them; spoiler alert, not good.

User cafenegroporfavor relates their own marking experience.
“I was marked with a marking talk, I was 16 and going through my parent’s divorce. Thanks to that talk, everyone, even my “friends” turned their back on me when I needed them the most. I was marked for “flirting” with a worldly kid, he was my friend supporting me in hard times, and the elders decided a worldly friend was enough for a marking talk. That episode resulted in PTSD and some more mental health issues.”

This is as much a condemnation here on the practice as on the ability of elders to deal with issues surrounding mental health.

User CraniumFuzz, talks about being marked for divorcing an unfaithful husband.
“I was marked for my now Ex-Husbands infidelity. Had I kept up my RP hours while dealing with a scandalously public divorce, obliged every inappropriate caress from “Oh-so-loving” Elders, and not sought out support from a qualified Therapist for abuse and C-PTSD, perhaps I could have been spared the humiliation of Reputation Assassination (at the musings of slanderous cohorts hell-bent on “Defamation of Character”).

Universally the experiences mentioned by other users spoke of the result being worse than the offence to the extent where being marked was a deciding factor in their leaving the religion. Clearly there’s no humanity in an exercise which is designed to isolate another human whilst trampling on their dignity.

How it started

The scriptural precedent for marking at 2 Thessalonians 3 is very fluid:
“We are giving you orders, brothers, in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, to withdraw from every brother walking disorderly and not according to the tradition you received from us. For your part, brothers, do not give up in doing right. But if anyone is not obedient to our word through this letter, keep this one marked, stop associating with him, that he may become ashamed. And yet do not be considering him as an enemy, but continue admonishing him as a brother.” (NWT)

This scripture was part of a reply in a Questions from Readers who asked if they could personally mark someone if they felt it was deserved. The scriptures are woolly in detail and provide an all-round moveable feast. What constitutes “walking disorderly”? The Shepherd the Flock manual provides the example of someone dating a worldly person.

It’s not unreasonable to ask why the entire marking policy is assigned to the elders. Paul’s letter is to the congregation, not the elders at Thessalonica, and suggests that marking is done at a personal level and is not a congregation matter.

This misinterpretation is further compounded by the suggestion that removing this stigma is done by the elders who are invited to resume associating thus signalling approval to the rest of the congregation – but this acceptance of the offender’s repentance doesn’t need to be unanimous:

“If the disorderly one is moved to change, the elders can individually decide to resume personally socializing with him . . .” meaning that half the elders can continue shunning the offender whilst the other half take them down the pub for a swift pint after the meeting. A confused congregation can now lift the marking based on which elder is your favourite.

The mechanics of marking are deliberately indiscreet making it clear that this is directed personally by littering the talk with such gems as “we have seen this already in our own congregation“. There’s little scope for anonymity with the jungle drums having most likely already identified the ‘who’, this juicy little talk will now identify the ‘what’. Even those not in the ring of confidence now can grub around to fill in the gaps in from the gossip mill.

This is yet another damaging and harmful practice by Watchtower and as with most of their punitive measures, the line between what is supposed to be loving and helpful and that which is abusive and destructive is defined by the opinions of unqualified, imperfect men.

G. B. Davis

[image error]JW Watch Contributor

The post Marking – a loving provision? appeared first on JW Watch.

Child Abuse Records Reveal Extensive Data Collection by Jehovah’s Witnesses

Attorneys representing Alexis Nunez have filed a motion to compel the Watchtower Bible and Tract Society of New York to turn over at least 10 pages of detailed database records involving abuser Max Reyes and three of his victims, including plaintiff Nunez.

According to documents tendered to the Sanders County Montana Court, Watchtower attorney Joel Taylor emailed three of the ten pages in question to the Nunez team on the eve of the final day of the 2018 trial held in Thompson Falls Montana. Taylor purportedly presented the sensitive documents as part of his strategy for closing arguments the next day.

The three pages in question have now been released in court filings, but attorneys for Nunez are demanding the entire 10-page dossier.

The database pages reveal the shocking extent of Watchtower’s internal child abuse investigations, including the disclosure that Watchtower Legal Department directors register whether or not victims of child abuse are “willing participants” in their own sexual abuse.

Jehovah’s Witness Child Abuse Victim Profile

The documents combine notes taken by Jehovah’s Witness elders with answers to questions posed by the Watchtower Legal Department in New York, blended with additional data used by the Witnesses’ Service Department to determine how abusers and victims should be managed inside the congregation.

Minor victims designated as “willing participants” are treated as adults and subjected to judicial hearings and disfellowshipping.

Watchtower Star Witness Identified As Additional Abuser of Nunez

In the 112-page motion to compel Watchtower to produce database documents, Nunez’s legal team revealed that Watchtower’s star trial witness, Peter McGowan, had confessed in 2014 to elders in Polson Montana that he too had molested the plaintiff, Alexis Nunez.

This information was not made public until now.

During the 2018 trial, Peter McGowan testified as a witness for Watchtower, stating that in 2004 he disclosed to his sister that he had been sexually abused by his stepfather Max Reyes. Watchtower attorney Joel Taylor elicited testimony from Peter to establish that his communications with Thompson Falls elder Don Herberger were confidential. Taylor also asked Peter about a conversation with his sister Holly McGowan in which Holly mentioned a possible lawsuit against Max Reyes.

Peter stated: “She called me and she wanted to participate in a lawsuit that her and my father were trying to put forward against Max. And I didn’t really feel comfortable. I just wanted — I told her I wanted to leave everything in the past and move on with my life.”

Peter McGowan’s trial testimony in 2018 appears to shed considerable light on the reasons Peter declined to participate in any litigation against the Watchtower organization. Notwithstanding the fact that he chose to remain in the church, his admission that he sexually abused his own niece places him in an untenable position.

Watchtower Letter to Plaintiff Identifying Peter McGowan as additional abuser of Nunez

The jury in the 2018 trial never heard evidence that Peter McGowan had molested the defendant. This information was outside the scope of legal negligence argued by Nunez, where the issue was Watchtower’s failure to report under Montana law. The circumstances have changed now that the case is back in the Sanders County Court where plaintiff Nunez is suing Watchtower for common law negligence.

The 2018 trial focused on evidence that Thompson Falls elders had violated Montana’s abuse reporting laws when they learned of the abuse of Holly and Peter McGowan, the aunt and uncle of Nunez. Nunez argued that this failure led to her own abuse before, during, and after the disfellowshipping of Max Reyes, her step-grandfather. Watchtower appealed the verdict, and in January of 2020, the Montana Supreme Court ruled that the Jehovah’s Witness elders were legally exempted by the reporting requirement. Jehovah’s Witnesses argued that their church could take advantage of a confidentiality exception in the Montana law.

Nunez immediately brought the case back before the Sanders County Court, contending that since Judge Manly had ruled in 2018 that elders violated the reporting laws, she never had the opportunity to argue her claims of common law negligence. In other words, while Watchtower’s elders were legally exempted from reporting Nunez’s abuse, the congregation and Watchtower can still be held liable for their negligence.

Why Demand the CM Database Pages?

As the Watchtower Organization continues to collect vast amounts of data related to sexual crimes, criminals, and victims, survivors are demanding answers for why this information is held by a religious institution and not promptly turned over to the relevant authorities.

Jehovah’s Witnesses currently subscribe to a policy where local elders are prevented from reporting child abuse unless the parent corporation Watchtower is unable to find a legal exception to the reporting requirement. The Church’s Legal Department has taken the position that what’s good enough for the Catholic Church is good enough for Jehovah’s Witnesses. The Witnesses believe they can project the Catholic confessional model upon all communications between members and their elders, regardless of whether the communications occurred in a confessional setting.

The Catholic model was originally set up to protect communications between a single confessor and his priest, but the Jehovah’s Witnesses expand the definition of protected communications to include their entire body of elders and all conversations with anyone involved in alleged wrongdoing.

In addition to the clergy-penitent confidentiality claims argued by the Witnesses, attorney-client privilege has become a decisive factor and key reason why Witness elders are instructed to promptly call Watchtower’s Legal Department when they learn of child abuse allegations – instead of calling the police.

In Montana, attorneys for Nunez demonstrated that Watchtower attorney Joel Taylor waived attorney-client privilege when he emailed 3 pages of Child Maltreatment (CM) data records just before midnight on September 25th, 2018. The strategy involved a last-minute attempt to support his closing arguments, but this tactic exposed the existence of 7 additional pages of comprehensive data including the abuse of Lexi Nunez by Watchtower’s key witness, Peter McGowan.

In the April 2021 Motion to Compel, Nunez argues:

“During the discovery phase of this case (before trial), Defendants refused to produce a certain ten-page document from their CM database on the basis that it was protected by the attorney work product and attorney client privilege… However, during trial, Defendants chose to waive their privilege claim by voluntarily disclosing privileged content from the document. Defendants produced substantial portions of the document to Plaintiff, hopeful that Defendants could use part of the document to benefit their case while withholding the remainder of the document that harms their case. Despite their voluntary waiver, Defendants now claim all ten pages are still privileged, including the three pages they produced.”

Watchtower Plays Semantics

Despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary, the Watchtower organization continues to deny that it maintains a database of child molesters and victims by arguing over the very definition of the word “database.”

On February 4th 2021, plaintiff Nunez ordered the discovery of multiple documents from Watchtower files, including a description of the “CM Database.”

The Jehovah’s Witness legal department responded by declaring that the documents demanded are not part of any kind of database, and that labeling it a database is a mischaracterization of the facts. Court records disclose Watchtower’s responses to the requests:

“INTERROGATORY NO. 1:

Describe the CM database by providing the following information. What is the name or designation the JW Defendants give to the database?

Generally describe the information contained in the database.

When was the database created?

ANSWER: [from Watchtower] Defendants object to this request because it is vague and ambiguous in that the term “CM database” is defined by a mischaracterization of what the documents attached as Exhibit A are: entries from the Watchtower Legal Department’ s electronic telephone record keeping system reflecting privileged communications with clients. Defendants further object to this interrogatory on the grounds that it is not reasonably calculated to lead to the discovery of admissible information.”

It is difficult to imagine that the Court will not see past the semantics game played by Watchtower, given the awareness that the information collected by this “electronic telephonic record keeping system” is shared with the Service Department of Watchtower. The Service Department of Jehovah’s Witnesses maintains a “Hub” database of Jehovah’s Witness information that is designed to consolidate member data for more than 8 million adherents, known as “publishers.” That information contains extensive personal information about each member, including internal judicial documents such as the S-77 Notice of Disfellowshipping or Disassociation.

Jehovah’s Witness Data Collection, where Publisher Identification is incorporated into the HuB Database. Image: leaked Watchtower video.

In 2017, sensitive documents and videos were leaked from inside Watchtower headquarters, revealing the extent of their data collection schemes. A program called HuB (Headquarters-unity-Branch) was announced as the replacement for their preceding global database and management system known as “Admin.”

Also announced was the “Records Management” system for maintaining vast amounts of organizational data in a centralized database. Old paper records were scanned into this new system using highly sophisticated equipment and character-recognition software, further enhancing the Organization’s ability to track every aspect of the Witnesses’ corporate empire, including sensitive personal data.

Judge Elizabeth Best now presides over the Montana case and will rule whether or not Watchtower will be compelled to turn over the 7 pages of data in question. The release of those documents may well have an adverse impact on the Jehovah’s Witness defense.

The trial date has been set for September, 2022.

The post Child Abuse Records Reveal Extensive Data Collection by Jehovah’s Witnesses appeared first on JW Watch.

Misinformation on the Australian Redress Scheme is Harmful to Survivors and It Must Stop

Senator Anne Ruston and the rest of the Australian government have so far been unwavering in holding the JW leadership accountable for the mishandling of abuse, but a poorly-written article tells a different story

Yesterday Cait Kelly at The New Daily put out an article on Jehovah’s Witnesses and their failure to join the Australian Redress scheme that on face value is both disheartening and enraging, at least from the perspective of victims of abuse from within the organization. The article heavily implies that the recent extension granted to Jehovah’s Witnesses allowing them a further eight years to join the redress scheme effectively gifts them impunity from punishment in the interim; exempting the organization from the threatened sanctions of having their charitable status removed.

Unfortunately Kelly’s article is poorly researched and leans heavily on information from two Australia-based ex-JW activists who seem to have misinterpreted the recent legislative changes regarding the redress scheme and leapt to incorrect conclusions regarding the charitable status of Jehovah’s Witnesses.

To make matters worse, a lawyer named Nick Hart, “the Principal Lawyer from Slater and Gordon,” is quoted as saying:

This delay may put survivors off making a claim, knowing they won’t have an entitlement to claim until the institution joins the scheme.

Nick Hart, Principal Lawyer at Slater and Gordon

Mr Hart is entitled to his opinion (who knows what information may or may not have been supplied by third parties leading him to his wrong conclusions) but for reasons I am about to explain, the extension (which Mr Hart refers to as a “delay”) manifestly makes it easier for survivors to make claims under the scheme, not more difficult.*

The trouble with some journalists

Both Mr Hart’s less-than-accurate summation of the situation and the factually incorrect statements from the cited ex-JW sources would ordinarily have been given short shrift by a skilled journalist of the stature of Trey Bundy, David Gambacorta or Douglas Quenqua – all of whom have written with masterful attention to detail on what is admittedly an outrageously complicated but deeply important subject: the mishandling of child sexual abuse by Jehovah’s Witnesses and its cover-up on an industrial scale through documented policies of secrecy.

But if my nearly ten years of experience as an ex-JW writer and activist has taught me anything, it’s that there’s no shortage of sloppy journalists like Cait Kelly around who will do minimal fact-checking and put out almost any story that will garner attention irrespective of its accuracy. This, unfortunately, is the case with her article titled “Child abuse survivor slams government’s 8-year extension of national redress scheme deadline.” Quite apart from being factually wrong and misleading, this article will almost inevitably result (perhaps already has resulted) in worsening the plight of ex-JW victims of abuse by insinuating that the Australian government is not holding the Jehovah’s Witness leadership accountable as promised.

Allow me to set the record straight. Here’s what we know:

On July 1, 2020, Jehovah’s Witnesses were named by the Australian government along with two other institutions as having failed to indicate any desire to join the redress scheme.On October 30, 2020 the Christian Congregation of Jehovah’s Witnesses in Australia wrote a letter to the Committee Secretariat of the Joint Select Committee on Implementation of the National Redress Scheme emphatically declaring that they would not be joining the scheme. The letter falsely claimed that the Jehovah’s Witness religion “does not have the institutional settings that the Redress Scheme is designed to cover.” On November 27, 2020, Senators Anne Ruston and Zed Seselja issued a joint statement declaring plans to “strip organisations of their charitable status if they fail to fulfil their obligation to join the National Redress Scheme for victims of institutional child sexual abuse.” The Senators declared it to be “completely unacceptable for named institutions to refuse to accept their moral obligation and responsibility to acknowledge the wrongs committed.” It was further explained that “deregistration [as a charity] would result in the entity losing access to a range of Commonwealth benefits, tax and other concessions.”On December 14, 2020 Senator Anne Ruston released a statement advising that (bold and italics mine) “Under the current rules governing the Scheme no institution can join the Scheme after 31 December 2020. This means that any institutions yet to be named by survivors would be unable to join the Scheme and potentially cause survivors to miss out on redress .” In the same statement, Senator Ruston explained: “Failure to join the Scheme within six months will mean that institution will be publicly named and have financial sanctions applied and loss of charitable status until they join the Scheme . This is absolutely not about letting institutions off the hook. What this change does is put the onus squarely on institutions to fulfil their moral obligation to survivors to own up to the wrongs of the past.”On January 22, 2021 a parliamentary session took place, the transcript of which is available here, where it was said regarding the deadline for joining the redress scheme: “It has now been extended to 31 January 2028, so effectively to six months before the end of the scheme.”

What has happened is breathtakingly simple and it has been spelled out very clearly in official press releases issued by the Australian Government. Jehovah’s Witnesses missed their chance to sign up to the redress scheme and they will rightly pay a heavy penalty in the form of deregistration as a charity, bringing with it the loss of certain tax benefits and other favorable concessions they previously enjoyed.

How soon will this happen? We will get to that small matter later. But let’s focus on the key issue of the deadline for joining the redress scheme and its adjustment from the end of 2020 to early 2028, which has produced this sudden torrent of misinformation. Simply put, this is a necessary and responsible measure that, far from being detrimental to victims, is actually in their interests.

The slamming door

Under the previous legislation, a dangerous loophole existed whereby the door slamming shut on CCJW Australia’s opportunity to join the redress scheme at the end of 2020 would have left JW abuse survivors without any recourse for redress.

Even in the albeit unlikely event of CCJW Australia having a change of heart, perhaps after seeing the consequences of being stripped of charitable status, there would have been no route back for them to join the scheme. They would have been prohibited under law from doing so! By wisely extending the deadline to 2028, the Australian government has made it possible for CCJW Australia to potentially do a u-turn on their refusal to join, which in turn makes it possible for victims from within the group to apply for and receive redress.

No participation in the scheme = no redress.

Far from “buying themselves time” or having “no clear … strategy to make the Jehovah’s Witness leaders accountable” the Australian Government has shown itself to be putting the needs of abuse survivors first by making sure there is a path for redress claims to be processed. As Senator Ruston said back in December, perhaps in anticipation of precisely the sort of confusion and misinformation we are now witnessing:

This is absolutely not about letting institutions off the hook.

Senator Anne Ruston

Without this crucial and prudent modification to the legislation, Jehovah’s Witnesses as an institution would have been rendered permanently excluded from being considered, at least potentially, as “participating institutions” under the scheme.

Would this have been helpful to victims? In no way, shape or form! As things stand, victims can still submit their claims in hopes that either (1) CCJW Australia will change its mind, or (2) “funds of last resort” will be made available to them. The latter are currently not available to abuse victims from among Jehovah’s Witnesses, but I understand the funds of last resort provisions are currently being reviewed as part of the two-year Senate review of the Redress Scheme with a report due at the end of this month. The point is: to be in with even a chance of getting redress, JW abuse victims needed the door to be open for participation. If the door had been slammed shut on Jehovah’s Witnesses at the end of last year, it would have been shut on abuse survivors too.

When will the organization be punished?

Apart from urgently needed redress and an apology, in my experience of speaking to and interviewing dozens of abuse survivors over the years what they overwhelmingly want is for the organization that failed them to be held accountable in some way. Far from dallying in this regard, the Australian government is currently leading the world in penalizing Jehovah’s Witnesses for letting down abuse survivors.

As Senators Ruston and Seselja unequivocally stated in November, deregistration as a charity beckons for any institution that fails to join the scheme. Jehovah’s Witnesses have not only failed to join – they have issued a letter to the government stating emphatically that they have no intention to! New legislation therefore makes it abundantly clear that they no longer get to call themselves a charity. When will their deregistration come into effect? We will have to wait and see exactly when and how this happens, but according to an amendment to the Australian Charities and Not-for-profits Commission Act 2012, which passed (gained “royal assent”) on December 17, 2020, this should happen on March 17, 2021 (this date being three months after the amendment received royal assent).

If for whatever reason March 17, 2021 comes and goes with absolutely no change in CCJW Australia’s charitable status, and with no sign of any reasonable justification for failure to take the promised action, then it will be time for ex-JWs to take to the streets and chastise the Australian government for its broken promises. But to remonstrate on this issue before promises have even been broken is deeply lamentable. What message does it send to other governments and politicians worldwide who are presently indifferent on this issue when the one country to impose reasonable and measured sanctions on Jehovah’s Witnesses for its failures on child abuse is attacked by the very activists and advocates who should be applauding?

An ongoing problem

As much as I hate to say it, the Jehovah’s Witness leadership is at least partially right when it accuses former members of being lying and deceitful. For my part, I do my very best to make sure all information I share with my viewers and readers is factual and truthful. I also surround myself with like-minded activists here at JW Watch and elsewhere who share my passion for exposing Jehovah’s Witnesses in an honest and responsible way.

But throughout my years of activism I have been wary of individuals who do not care much about facts and seem to thrive on engineered drama and sensationalism. When this has the effect of dissuading doubting Jehovah’s Witnesses from reviewing “apostate” information it is bad enough. But in this case I am seeing something far worse. I am seeing horrific and traumatizing childhood abuse exacerbated through needlessly shattered hopes and expectations. I am seeing abuse survivors who have already been through unimaginable ordeals being manipulated into joining an outrage army; stirred up by invented problems to mobilize against foes who are, in reality, allies.

If you are a victim of abuse from among Jehovah’s Witnesses, take heart from knowing that there is at least one country on our planet that is so far punishing the leadership that facilitated your abuse, and it is the “land down under.” Don’t despair at the lamentable “false stories” being circulated by a small minority of ex-Jehovah’s Witnesses who seem anxious to hurl themselves into the apostate stereotype carved out for them by the organization. If I am wrong and the Australian government reneges on its promises without any clear explanation, I will join you and be at your side in demanding justice. But the time to do that will be after March 17, and not a moment sooner.

*I am represented as a Core Participant before the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse in England and Wales by Richard Scorer, who is Head of Abuse at a firm named Slater and Gordon, which is based in Manchester, UK. I have been asked to make it clear that neither Richard nor his firm have any affiliation with Nick Hart or the Australian “Slater and Gordon.”

I would like to thank Kim Silvio, Head of Operations and Legal Advisor to JW Watch, for her invaluable assistance in writing this article. Kim is a retired lawyer and she remains at the disposal of any Australia-based abuse survivors who need help with lodging claims under the redress scheme. Kim can be contacted on support@jwsurvey.org

The post Misinformation on the Australian Redress Scheme is Harmful to Survivors and It Must Stop appeared first on JW Watch.

Results of the 2018 Global Survey of Jehovah’s Witnesses

[image error]

Yes, I know! To state the obvious, I realize how overdue this article is. It’s been a work in progress for many months now, in part because I have this very annoying perfectionist streak, which does not help! I also wanted to take the time to do the results of the 2018 Survey justice and looking back at all that happened during that year was quite the rabbit hole! The results of the survey itself are fascinating and if you would like to download the full results in PDF form, you can do so here:

2018 Global SurveyDownload

As we review the year I have interspersed some of the statistics that came from the 2018 Survey below, so let’s begin!

2018 started explosively with the online release of confidential Watchtower child sexual abuse documents by non-profit organisation Faithleaks (now known as The Truth and Transparency Foundation). The 33 documents were a compilation of letters sent between Watchtower and individuals in the Palmer Congregation, Massachusetts, USA. They were a very distressing read to say the least, revealing the awful accusations of child sex abuse from three Jehovah’s Witness women against a Ministerial Servant in their congregation. Exposing a pattern of behavior that has become sadly predictable, the documents shed further light on the terrible mishandling of abuse by Watchtower. Jennings Brown, Senior Editor and Reporter at the Gizmodo website well summarized the 69 pages of documents, saying:

[image error]

https://gizmodo.com/new-whistleblower-site-faithleaks-releases-confidential-1821799936?IR=T

The leaks became known as the “Palmer Leaks” and the Watchtower in Focus team devoted Episode 8 to discussing the previously confidential documents: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nxe-pnKv3n0.

However, Watchtower decided to launch the new year with a Watchtower study article discussed by all congregations in January 2018 that explained why the words of one of their songs had been changed. In the November 2017 Study Edition, the first article “Make a Joyful Sound!” stated in paragraph 17:

[image error]

“The change of the title “Guard Your Heart” to “We Guard Our Hearts” was most considerate. Why? In the audience at our meetings, assemblies, and conventions are many new ones, interested ones, young ones and sisters who by singing the words would be put in the awkward position of telling others what to do. So the title and the lyrics were modified.” [italics ours] https://wol.jw.org/en/wol/d/r1/lp-e/2017641#h=1:0

If only Watchtower gave as much careful attention and consideration to the protection of children and their internal policies of dealing with child sexual abuse accusations as they do the wording of their “Kingdom Melodies” and the terrible danger that women pose when it comes to singing words at men!

JW Survey’s Covert Fade covered this lyrical nugget in his article: https://jwsurvey.org/mind-control/watchtower-says-beware-danger-women-singing-instructions-men while Lloyd Evans explored the deeper underlying issues in his video on the John Cedars channel: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7jZ2ERLa1lE

[image error]

In the State of Delaware, USA, Jehovah’s Witnesses were fined and paid $19,500 for failure to report child sexual abuse. On January 18th, 2018 a formal agreement was signed between attorneys representing Jehovah’s Witnesses and the State of Delaware settling the case where two elders and one congregation were held responsible for withholding detailed knowledge of child sexual abuse. Included in the signing of the agreement was the stipulation that Jehovah’s Witness elders must comply with all Delaware statues involving the reporting of child abuse. In addition, the body of elders from the Laurel Congregation in Delaware were required to attend the Stewards of Children training program and to pay the associated costs. JWsurvey’s own Mark O’Donnell reported the details of this case: https://jwsurvey.org/child-abuse-2/jehovahs-witness-elders-fined-for-failure-to-report-child-abuse-watchtower-settles-with-delaware

[image error]



[image error]

Jennifer, left, and Martin Haugh sit for a portrait at their home in New Cumberland, Pa., on Tuesday, March 27, 2018. Their daughter is pictured around age five in a family photo album. When their daughter was four, she was molested by a family member at their Jehovah’s Witness congregation in Red Lion. The couple has since left the Jehovah’s Witnesses, which urged them to keep the abuse a secret.
TIM TAI / Staff Photographer – The Philadelphia Inquirer

In September 2018, the December 2018 issue of the Watchtower Study Edition was released – and it outraged many. Within the pages of the study article “Honor What God Has Yoked Together” there was extremely disturbing and shocking advice for women who find themselves in domestic abuse marriages. The article confirmed that divorce is only permissible in cases of adultery. Separation is inferred as less desirable since a couple would still be marriage mates, albeit living apart. The article stated in paragraph 15: “if sexual immorality is not involved, the goal should be reconciliation. The two could seek Bible-based help from congregation elders. While the elders avoid taking sides, they could offer Scriptural advice.”

[image error]

Leaving aside the painfully obvious lack of education and training qualifying elders to provide such mediation, the tone of the article appeared to praise those who remain with an abusive mate inferring that by doing so there is a chance of the unbelieving mate becoming a “true worshipper.” Also note that the scenario painted by Watchtower involves an unbelieving mate doing the abusing. Craftily, Watchtower sets the narrative and completely ignores and turns a blind eye to the many anecdotal cases of domestic violence involving believing Witnesses!

[image error]




[image error]

“17 Admittedly, there have been instances where an “unbelieving husband” seems to prove that he is not “agreeable to staying with her.” He might be extremely physically abusive, even to the point that she feels that her health or life is in danger. He might refuse to support her and the family or severely endanger her spirituality. In such cases, some Christians have personally decided that, despite what he might say, the mate is not “agreeable to staying” together and that a separation is necessary. But other Christians in comparably difficult situations have not; they have endured and tried to work at improving matters. Why? “

“18 In such a separation, the two are still marriage mates. If they lived apart, each one would face challenges, as mentioned earlier. The apostle Paul gave another reason for staying united. He wrote: “The unbelieving husband is sanctified in relation to his wife, and the unbelieving wife is sanctified in relation to the brother; otherwise, your children would be unclean, but now they are holy.” (1 Cor. 7:14) Many loyal Christians have remained with an unbelieving mate under very trying circumstances. They can testify that doing so was worthwhile in a special sense when their mate became a true worshipper.​—Read 1 Corinthians 7:16; 1 Pet. 3:1, 2.” WT Dec 2018

The JWsurvey team receive countless emails from people telling horrific stories of domestic abuse from believers – and yet, in this article, Watchtower sidesteps this very real issue and places it in the realms of fantasy by only allowing for the possibility of domestic abuse in religiously divided households. Such advice, as seen in this article, is grossly irresponsible, damaging, harmful, and life-threatening. It reveals an organisation that is tone-deaf, ignorant and uneducated as to what domestic violence actually is and how it proliferates.

On September 26th, 2018, a Montana jury handed down the largest-ever punitive damages award for a single abuse victim. The Watchtower Bible and Tract Society of New York, along with the Christian Congregation of Jehovah’s Witnesses, were found guilty of both negligence and malice in connection with the intentional failure to file police reports on behalf of plaintiff Alexis Nunez and two additional victims. Four million dollars was awarded to Nunez on the count of negligence, followed by a 31 million dollar punitive verdict on the count of malice. Sadly, the jury’s verdict was later overturned on a technicality. Nevertheless, JWsurvey editor Mark O’Donnell was in the courtroom observing the proceedings and you can read his blow-by-blow account here: https://jwsurvey.org/child-abuse-2/jehovahs-witnesses-found-guilty-of-malice-and-negligence-victim-awarded-35-million-in-montana-lawsuit

The Watchtower in Focus team further discussed the Montana verdict in Episode 15: https://youtu.be/oaUK1gnVWu8

[image error]

On November 13th, 2018, we all excitedly watched the A&E airing of Leah Remini’s: “Scientology and the Aftermath” Special Episode focussing on Jehovah’s Witnesses. For so many of us who have suffered abuse from cruel, cold and heartless Watchtower policies, it was cathartic and healing to see Leah use her formidable and informative platform to raise awareness of those abuses. You can stream the episode from aetv.com here: https://www.aetv.com/shows/leah-remini-scientology-and-the-aftermath/season-3/episode-0

To process and debrief the enormity of the special episode’s impact, the Watchtower in Focus team assembled to discuss this welcome exposure: https://youtu.be/WimTjKLjfGI

With the organization still reeling from the Aftermath Special Episode, on November 19th, 2018, Dutch police raided Watchtower’s branch office at Emmen along with two kingdom halls and a number of other properties connected to Watchtower – all with the aim of finding evidence of possible neglect concerning child safeguarding. Again, the Watchtower in Focus team came together to discuss the Dutch raids: https://youtu.be/NyRCU0Kl-Wo. They also had opportunity to talk with Neil Smith, a member of the legal team involved in the Montana case, who offered some very interesting insights into that case.

On a personal note, December 17th, 2018, was a special day for Sacha and I – as that was the day that Lloyd invited us to join the JWsurvey team. We both feel incredibly privileged to be a part of this hard working volunteer team and we very much enjoy our respective roles (my role as the Survey Editor and Sacha as the Aftercare & Support Manager) and the platform it affords us to do exactly what we want: to help as many as we can.

Finally, I would like to thank all of you for participating in the 2018 Survey and for your support of the Global Survey. 568 of you took the time to offer comments and suggestions and I read through them all – there are some excellent suggestions there so look out for a fresh 2020 Survey soon (and yes, I’ve noted the typos!).

Please be assured that you will not have as long to wait for the 2019 Survey results. I’ve been wanting to work on these for some time, but I first wanted to do justice to the 2018 Survey. The 2019 Survey shattered the record number of participants (2015 Survey had 6,083 respondents) with 7,180 taking part! I’m incredibly excited to share those results with you soon. In the meantime, please stay tuned for the release of the 2020 Survey. We want as many voices as possible to be heard and I very much look forward to hearing yours!

[image error]

The post Results of the 2018 Global Survey of Jehovah’s Witnesses appeared first on JWsurvey.

Jehovah’s Witnesses Denied Plasma Treatment Amid Coronavirus Pandemic

[image error]

Jehovah’s Witnesses have been directed that they are forbidden from accepting Convalescent Plasma Therapy, a new treatment that appears to offer hope for patients stricken with coronavirus.

A leaked memo from a Jehovah’s Witness Circuit Overseer instructs elders in his circuit that accepting plasma treatments to ward off COVID-19 is “unacceptable.”

While these instructions are in harmony with current Witness teachings on blood and are for dissemination among a limited number of congregations, the material emphasizes the organization’s willingness to place their theology above the need to preserve life.

The two-page letter, received under conditions of anonymity, cites the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) announcement on March 24th that certain patients may be eligible to receive plasma collected from individuals who have recovered from COVID-19.

Evidence collected by researchers suggests that the antibodies present in the plasma of recovered patients may help neutralize the COVID-19 virus.

The use of plasma, however, is strictly forbidden by Jehovah’s Witnesses, who adhere to a controversial ban on blood treatments dating back to 1945.

Multiple reports have focused on the implementation and success of this new treatment, which has been approved for testing in New York State. Jehovah’s Witnesses, headquartered in New York, promptly seized the opportunity to enforce their ban on whole blood, including red and white cells, platelets, and plasma.

The new directive from a Jehovah’s Witness representatives says:

“The Blood Issue: There’s talk about the FDA allowing doctors to treat critically ill COVID-19 patients with “convalescent plasma therapy”. It would be wise to advise the publishers that, it’s understood that this is giving the patient the whole plasma of the person who has developed the antibodies which would be unacceptable for a Jehovah’s Witness.”

“However if the antibodies were extracted from the plasma (fractions/immunoglobulins) and then given to the patient, it would be a conscience matter for a Jehovah’s Witness. Some doctors may view plasma as a fraction. Therefore the publisher may need to explain their personal decision not to accept any of the blood’s 4 main components, one of them being plasma. (Regarding the main components and fractions, see lvs pp. 246-249 & km 11/06 p. 5 Work Sheet 1)”

Witness leaders appear concerned that amidst the pandemic dimensions of the Coronavirus, some critically ill church members may be tempted to accept plasma therapy treatment.

… it’s understood that this is giving the patient the whole plasma of the person who has developed the antibodies which would be unacceptable for a Jehovah’s Witness

Letter from Governing Body Representative and Circuit Overseer

For decades Jehovah’s Witness leaders have, with relative ease, managed to exercise jurisdiction over their members’ medical decisions related to blood by means of a global network of Hospital Liasion Committees (HLC). Witness elders assigned to these Committees are pejoratively referred to as the “Blood Police” due to their enforcement of the transfusion ban in hospitals around the world.

[image error]When Witnesses are “threatened” with transfusion

However, the rapidly spreading Coronavirus has triggered numerous global responses from upper Witness management, indicating that enforcement of their deadly blood policy may prove abnormally challenging. Among the complications of policy execution is the likelihood that church elders will no longer be permitted to enter the wards of critically ill members stricken with the virus.

Watchtower Enforces Past Policy

The letter cites the Witness publication “How to Remain in God’s Love” – a 2017 book which outlines the rules and regulations followed by Witnesses, and enforced by congregation elders.

[image error]JWsurvey.

Pennsylvania Opens Grand Jury Criminal Investigation Into Jehovah’s Witnesses; JW Survey Editor Subpoenaed

[image error]

In 1884, the Watch Tower Bible and Tract Society was incorporated in the Court of Common Pleas in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. The movement of Charles Taze Russell became an established religious business, a tax-exempt corporation that would go on to control the lives of more than 8 million devoted followers,

One hundred years later and four hours southeast of Allegheny, I was baptized as one of Jehovah’s Witnesses in a tiled, heated baptismal pool in Crownsville Maryland. I was 16.

Thirty-five years after that, the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania served me with a subpoena to testify in a Grand Jury investigation into alleged criminal activity by the very same religious organization to which I devoted the formative and working years of my life. Let me explain why this happened.

[image error]

I grew up in Baltimore, Maryland, the only child of devoted Jehovah’s Witness parents who had embraced the religion following the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, the Cuban Missile Crisis, and the escalation of the Vietnam war. Jehovah’s Witnesses pounded the pavements of Baltimore, preaching the imminence of Armageddon.

Watchtower vice-president and oracle Frederick W. Franz famously came to Baltimore in 1966, delivering multiple conventions speeches, including the epic book-release of Life Everlasting in Freedom of the Sons of God. This 400+ page publication unveiled a shocking timetable of world events, including the revelation that 1975 would mark the most significant modern date in history.

From that moment forward, everything changed. Urgency over the date 1975 drove Witnesses into a subtle frenzy, with Organization overseers using these new revelations as spiritual cattle prods, driving many to sell their homes and preach the news of the end of the world.

When I was 8 years old, 1975 came and went, but new predictions emerged, and the old ones were revised. As a child, I could not accept that I was being lied to, so I trusted Jehovah’s Witnesses and their appointed elders.

Among the most trusted elders was a man named Charles Brineshults. Charlie, as he was known, was a long-time appointed elder, a widower, and held the distinction of being one of the elite few remaining “anointed” Jehovah’s Witnesses on Earth. He was also a serial pedophile, but I didn’t know that.

[image error]Charles “Charlie” Brineshults

Even as a child my instincts told me something was not right. Brineshults shuffled from family to family, latching on to the generosity of anyone who would take him in. Of course, the homes he selected and the families he embraced all had children. Vulnerable children.

It was not until about 10 years ago during a group vacation that a close friend and longstanding elder heard the name Brineshults in conversation, and he piped in “Oh yeah, he diddled kids, you didn’t know?”

“What?” I exclaimed as I shot a piercing gaze across the South Carolina beach resort, expecting to hear this was some kind of joke. But it wasn’t. As it turns out, it was an open secret among dozens of families and nearly all of the elders in the congregation circuits I grew up in.

I was horrified. At that moment I could instantly recall sitting in the rear of a Kingdom Hall after a meeting, watching Charlie approach me with my father nearby. “Mark is so polite when he answers the phone, I am very impressed He speaks to clearly and with such maturity.”

I was barely 10 years old. Like so many others, I was unaware I was being groomed, and were it not for the screen of my extra-protective mother, I would most certainly have been one of his many victims.

And then there was Ongsingco.

Louis Ongsingco was a charismatic Watchtower-appointed pioneer minister and self-declared pied piper of the local Jehovah’s Witness children. He was engaging, well-traveled, and he liked girls. Young girls.

[image error]Louis Ongsingco

Louis was a jet-setting flight attendant who frequently returned from Paris or London with expensive chocolates and other gifts for the kids he liked the most. He was also a massage therapist.

He had a smooth-talking way of conversing with teen girls, advancing his hands further and further from their shoulders to their backs, then finally blurring the lines between friendly conduct and full-on sexual assault. I saw this myself.

I was barely a teenager when I approached local elder Robert “Bob” Manke about Ongsingco’s behavior with girls. Where else would I go? My parents couldn’t control Louis, and I didn’t know that this was a matter for the police. How could I? So I trusted that Manke and the other elders would handle the situation.

They didn’t. Instead, they told Ongsingco that I had outed him, which led to severe chastisement from Louis himself. It was frightening. Meanwhile, Louis kept up his behavior, and decades passed. After leaving the Witness religion in 2013, I wanted to see what happened to this man.

After a brief investigation, I discovered that Louis Ongsingco went on to sexually assault multiple women, both Jehovah’s Witnesses, and non-Witnesses. By 2001 at least seven different women filed two lawsuits against Ongsingco.

[image error]

These lawsuits are independent of additional allegations against Ongsingco, including those of two women who claim that Ongsingco placed his hands down the front of their shirts when they were teenagers.

One of those women came forward to the Atlantic in 2019 and was interviewed by journalist Doug Quenqua, who investigated Jehovah’s Witnesses in his article The Secret Database of Child abuse.

The Atlantic Article

In 2018 I was introduced to journalist Douglas Quenqua, a respected writer whose work has appeared in the New York Times, CNBC, Buzzfeed, and other periodicals. Doug had learned that I had received hundreds of pages of child abuse case documents from several Jehovah’s Witness congregations, and he wanted to learn more.

Over the course of 2018, we spent a number of days discussing these documents, and why Jehovah’s Witnesses had not reported these cases to the police. The incidents were horrifying, and worse yet, they revealed that most of the perpetrators were still at large, and were in contact with children.

On March 22nd, 2019, the Atlantic released Doug’s article. 24 Hours later, two elders rang our doorbell before 10 AM. We did not answer. When we checked our security camera later, it was apparent who these men were. They were church elders from the Perry Hall Congregation of Jehovah’s Witnesses in Maryland.

One of the two elders is the father of a woman who was sexually assaulted by not one, but two Jehovah’s Witness men. The men were Brineshults and Ongsingco.

[image error]Two Church Elders at my door, seeking to disfellowship

I remember thinking how pathetic it was to be chased down by the very men who have been covering up child abuse for years, and whose children were among the victims.

On April 14th, 2019, Watchtower representative and local church elder Joel Raniolo mailed two certified letters to my home, demanding that we attend a judicial hearing at the Perry Hall church. When reached, Raniolo refused to divulge why he had sent the letters, and how he had obtained our personal information.

On May 14th, 2019, another Church elder announced to the Perry Hall congregation that Mark and Kimberly O’Donnell are no longer Jehovah’s Witnesses. It had been 35 years since my indoctrination and baptism back in February 1984.

The Pennsylvania Grand Jury

In the weeks following the release of the Atlantic article, national and global attention became focused on the Jehovah’s Witness religion. In particular, the Pennsylvania Office of the Attorney General took notice of the allegations of corruption within the Witness Organization.

The State of Pennsylvania is no stranger to the cover-up of abuse within religious organizations. In 2018, the Attorney General’s office released the results of a two-year investigation into the Catholic church, following multiple substantiated reports of child sexual abuse and corresponding cover-ups.

On July 2nd, 2019 I was interviewed in my home by the Deputy Assistant Attorney General of Pennsylvania, along with a Special Investigator for the State. For more than three hours I provided documentation and details concerning the policies and practices of Jehovah’s Witnesses, especially in connection with child abuse.

On July 29th a Special Investigator arrived at my Baltimore home and served a subpoena for me to appear before the 45th Investigative Grand Jury of the State of Pennsylvania.

Finally, on August 22nd, 2019, I arrived at the State Capitol before 7.30 AM and was sworn in by Judge J. Wesley Oler in his chambers. Moments later I entered the large Grand Jury room, where 23 grand jurors and approximately 12-15 alternates were stationed at their desks, positioned to take notes and record their questions on paper.

A Grand Jury is a special tool used by state and federal governments to investigate criminal allegations against persons or institutions. The powers of grand juries are wide-ranging and potent. They include the ability to subpoena and compel witnesses to testify, and those witnesses are encouraged to speak freely and without fear of reprisal.

Any form of retaliation is taken seriously by the office of the Attorney General and the presiding judge. Of course, Jehovah’s Witnesses had already executed retaliation on my wife and me in response to our efforts to shed light on the epidemic child abuse problem within the religion.

My testimony lasted more than two straight hours as I sat facing the Grand Jury and the Deputy Attorney General, together with several State Attorneys and Special Investigators.

Grand Juries can be cathartic experiences for cooperative witnesses who testify on the side of civil justice. That was my experience.

For the first half of my initial testimony, I recounted my personal history within the Jehovah’s Witness religion, beginning with my religiously isolated childhood. It was an opportunity to share my experiences with a large group of citizens who will ultimately make important decisions when they vote on the choices presented to them.

There were moments of levity amidst the proceedings, including a curious exchange in which I discussed the history of the Witnesses’ custom Bible, the New World Translation. I explained how the translation was largely the brainchild of Frederick W. Franz, whose linguistic education was limited to a maximum of two years study of Greek, and no training in Hebrew.

The irony of this information was not lost upon the investigating members of the Grand Jury.

The Grand Jury and the JW Organization

As the morning progressed, my testimony turned North to the driving force behind the reason these people were assembled in this room- to comprehend whether the religious hierarchy which drives this religion is responsible for the failure to report the crime of child abuse.

A large whiteboard was placed to my left, facing the grand jurors. At the very top, the letters “GB” were written in large letters, then circled. It was clear that the Deputy Attorney General of Pennsylvania understood that the decisions and power of this religion lay at the top of a complicated network of corporations, congregations, Circuit Overseers, and churchgoers.

I spent some time attempting to explain the spider web of mechanisms used by Jehovah’s Witnesses, describing the difference between their view of the spiritual and the legal.

Branch Committees, Corporations, Circuit Overseers, Congregations, Elders, Ministerial Servants, Pioneers, Publishers- all of these found their way to the diagram of the Witness organization. Lines were drawn connecting all of the organizational machinery which comprises the Jehovah’s Witness religion. In the end, all roads terminated at the Governing Body.

After testifying for more than two hours, I was excused and held in a waiting area while the Grand Jurors scribbled their questions on paper and handed them to the Deputy Assistant Attorney General, after which I was brought back into the room, and given the opportunity to respond to the questions.

The process was dignified, thorough, but clearly an incremental process. Four months later, I found myself escorted once again into the halls of Pennsylvania justice, this time in a brand new government complex even more secure than the prior Strawberry Square location.

Grand juries are most often 18 months in length, with citizen jurors obliged to comply with the civic duty once per month for several days at a stretch. In some cases, grand juries are extended another 6 months. So it was no surprise that I returned 4 months after my initial testimony, this time to discuss documents.

Documents

The smoking gun of certain crimes lies in the creation of a paper trail of evidence that substantiates repetitive negligent or criminal behavior. If there’s one thing the Jehovah’s Witnesses are not lacking, it’s documents.

From the inception of Watch Tower Pennsylvania in 1884, Jehovah’s Witnesses have been in the document business. As the religion branched from printing Bibles and books to buying and selling real estate, the global corporations expanded, and so did the need to maintain centralized control over a growing member base.

By the 1970s, the Witnesses had tightened controls over congregation elders, formed Governing Body Committees, and published letters to all Elders on various corporation letterheads. They even began publishing a secret elder’s manual with strict instructions that it be concealed from anyone not an elder.

The expansion of congregation elder bodies meant that members trusted local elders to handle certain matters which would otherwise be best handled by law enforcement. Elder bodies became the police department for Jehovah’s Witnesses.

As the organization became further centralized, policy letters became the norm. While many documents dealt with routine activities for the church, other letters started to emerge which seemed to border on matters best left for law enforcement.

On July 1st, 1989, Watchtower New York issued a now-famous six-page letter to all congregation elders, labeled “confidential.” This letter warned elders not to divulge confidential information to “unauthorized” persons, including the police.

[image error]

It was clear that the rising number of child abuse cases in the Organization needed to be addressed, but Watchtower insisted that their New York Legal department act as first point of contact for any elders who learn of abuse.

This letter served as the opening salvo in a policy of obstruction of justice for victims of child abuse and the law enforcement agents who could have helped them.

On December 18th, 2019, I sat before the Pennsylvania Grand Jury, listening to the reading of the entire six-page letter from 1989.

It began to hit me how serious these letters were, and how vital they are to the investigation into Jehovah’s Witnesses. Every line, every paragraph was dissected and scrutinized. And then more letters were introduced.

On March 14, 1997, Watchtower released yet another directive to elders, and this time they asked for documentation of known child abusers serving in any congregation. It was, in effect, an official announcement of a secret database of child abusers.

On Page two, the letter stated:

“However, the body of elders should discuss this matter and give the Society a report on anyone who is currently serving or who formerly served in a Society-appointed position in your congregation who is known to have been guilty of child molestation in the past.”

This single sentence has formed the basis for a series of civil lawsuits in California in which attorney Irwin Zalkin and his team have worked many years to expose, knowing that Watchtower is harboring the names of thousands of child abusers in its database. Many of the abusers are still at large and serving in positions of authority among Jehovah’s Witnesses.

These were just a few of the many letters I reviewed and certified as authentic for the Pennsylvania Grand Jury.

What Effect Will the Grand Jury Have?

I cannot speculate on the full nature of this investigation, as these proceedings are sealed off from the public and the press. The Office of the Attorney General cannot confirm or deny that there is an investigation. They cannot confirm or deny that they will seek to investigate and subpoena specific individuals, such as victims, attorneys, experts, active elders, or members of the organization who serve at the highest level.

[image error]Subpoena for the 45th Investigative Grand Jury

Only those who testify, and who have not been placed under a gag order from the presiding judge may discuss their testimony, if they choose to do so. Otherwise, until their investigation is complete, they will not comment.

There are a number of possible consequences of this Grand Jury investigation, and it may take some time before we see the results. One outcome is a presentment- a recommendation that charges be filed against a person or organization. Another outcome is a formal report, like the Catholic Church report released in 2018.

Whatever the case, the Office of the Attorney General has the power to issue search warrants and subpoenas, to compel testimony, and may even cross state lines to accomplish their work.

After a lifetime in the Jehovah’s Witness organization, having seen the damaging effects of child abuse and the cover-up of these crimes, I am thankful that the Government of Pennsylvania has finally turned its attention to the organization which silenced the voices of survivors and those who champion their rights.

[image error]







[image error]

The post Pennsylvania Opens Grand Jury Criminal Investigation Into Jehovah’s Witnesses; JW Survey Editor Subpoenaed appeared first on JWsurvey.

Jehovah’s Witness UK Headquarters Dissolves Kingdom Hall Charities, Seizes Full Control of Property and Finances

[image error]

JW Survey has obtained documents affirming that the Jehovah’s Witness headquarters in the United Kingdom has orchestrated a systematic takeover bid of all Kingdom Hall properties located in England, Scotland and Wales.

In a letter dated November 8th, 2019, the London-based Kingdom Hall Trust announced that all UK congregations will dissolve their status as individual charities and become branches of the KHT.

The Kingdom Hall Trust (KHT) is a Jehovah’s Witness legal corporation established in 1939 as the London Company of Kingdom Witnesses. On June 30, 1978, it was officially registered as a charity in the UK.

In 1994, the name was changed to the Kingdom Hall Trust.

While the KHT was already engaged in the acquisition of property used by Jehovah’s Witness church members, the latest directive “proposes” that all UK Branch Congregations relinquish their individual charity status and operate under the blanket control of the Kingdom Hall Trust charity.

Five documents were leaked, including a private letter to all elders, a separate letter to be read to congregations, and an FAQ document explaining the dissolution of congregation charities. Also included are the pre-formatted meeting minutes and congregation resolutions to be filled out, resolved, and returned to the KHT.

According to the letter presented to individual congregations, the UK Charity Commission approved the merging of all UK congregations into the Kingdom Hall Trust, with the premise that all congregations in the United Kingdom agree to these changes.

The language used cleverly suggests that the merger is optional:

“Your charity is now being invited to take part in this process and merge with The Kingdom Hall Trust. Next week a resolution will be put to all baptized members of your congregation so that you can decide whether or not to go along with this proposal.” [bold ours]

It may be of interest to the Charity Commission that congregational compliance to central directives is not optional. All resolutions placed before congregation members from the Jehovah’s Witness governing entities are passed without contest.

Financial Implications

While the Kingdom Hall Trust directors state that these changes are for purposes of simplification, the leaked documents suggest that permanent control of property and finances may be the true motivation.

The November 2019 letter to congregation members says:

“However, because elders would no longer serve as trustees, your local donations would be administered by KHT as part of its general funds. This could mean that the Trustees decide to use your donations to support the Kingdom work elsewhere in our branch territory and throughout the world to meet the needs of our brothers and sisters. This is in harmony with the equalizing explained at 2 Corinthians 8:14 “… that by means of an equalizing, your surplus at the present time might offset their need, so that their surplus might also offset your deficiency, that there may be an equalizing”.” [bold ours]

While Witnesses have always been able to donate funds to the “Worldwide” work, the latest directive appears to give the Kingdom Hall Trust the ability to extract funds normally marked for local use only, and allocate them for use by Jehovah’s Witness leadership anywhere in the world.

A Mirror of Watchtower’s US Takeover?

Nearly six years ago, JW Survey reported on the shocking 2014 news in which all U.S. congregations were put on notice that they would henceforth remit fixed, permanent donations to Watchtower headquarters, even if their Kingdom Hall property was already paid off.

It was further revealed that all funds in excess of $5,000 were to be forwarded to the organization for use elsewhere. In some cases, congregations transferred hundreds of thousands of dollars to Watchtower, losing all command of locally donated funds.

At the same time, Kingdom Hall ownership was locked down by Watchtower’s corporate headquarters in New York, ensuring complete hierarchical control of all financial and property assets.

The 2019 documents issued from London reveal much more than the mere transfer of Charity Commission responsibilities. They clearly state that individual congregations no longer own or control their own properties, many of which have been in operation for more than 100 years.

[image error]JWsurvey.

Montana Supreme Court Rules Church Doctrine Trumps Mandatory Abuse Reporting Law, $35M Verdict Against Jehovah’s Witnesses Reversed

[image error]

In a shocking reversal of a 2018 Judicial civil verdict, the Montana Supreme court has ruled that Jehovah’s Witnesses were under no obligation to report the sexual molestation of three minors.

Justice Beth Baker penned the 18-page decision, which overturns a 35 million dollar jury verdict against defendants Watchtower of New York and the Thompson Falls congregation of Jehovah’s Witnesses.

In 2018, District Judge James Manley determined that Watchtower, the governing corporation of Jehovah’s Witnesses, and Thompson Falls congregation elders violated Montana’s annotated code, which requires that mandatory reporters notify police following allegations of child sexual abuse. The case went to trial, and a jury awarded Alexis Nunez $35 million dollars as a penalty for the Church’s negligence and malice.

While both sides stipulated that Witness elders are members of the clergy and are mandated reporters, the Supreme Court of Montana has applied the clergy-confidentiality exception [41-3-201(6)(c)] to this case. This reporting loophole effectively states that if a church declares its internal child abuse investigations as confidential, they are exempt from the reporting requirement.

[image error]

Justice Baker’s opening statement says:

“Watchtower Bible and Tract Society of New York, Inc., Christian Congregation of Jehovah’s Witnesses, and Thompson Falls Congregation of Jehovah’s Witnesses (collectively, “Jehovah’s Witnesses”) appeal the Twentieth Judicial District Court’s ruling that they violated Montana’s mandatory child abuse reporting statute, § 41-3-201, MCA, and its order granting summary judgment to Plaintiff Alexis Nunez on her negligence per se claim. They also appeal the court’s award of punitive damages following a jury trial. We hold that Jehovah’s Witnesses are excepted from the mandatory reporting statute under § 41-3-201(6)(c), MCA, because the undisputed material facts in the record show that Jehovah’s Witnesses canon law, church doctrine, or established church practice required that the reports of abuse in this case be kept confidential. We therefore reverse the District Court’s grant of summary judgment to Alexis and remand for entry of summary judgment in favor of Jehovah’s Witnesses. Because this issue is dispositive, we do not reach the punitive damages award or the Jehovah’s Witnesses’ other arguments.”

This proclamation from the highest court in Montana reveals the sinister and calamitous power wielded by religious institutions, which are permitted to self-immunize their ranking elders from obeying abuse reporting laws, while every other organization is required to comply.

[image error]

Not surprisingly, the law raised immediate concerns with members of several religious groups, who voiced their objections on January 30, 1991, during the 52nd Legislative session. Pastor Doug Kelley of the Helena community church strongly opposed the bill, saying:

“I would submit to you that this is absurd. You cannot include us and at the same time say it will not interfere with our practice. Part of the practice of religion is confidentiality. To mandate that you are going to include clergy in all mandatory reporting you are going cause a tremendous conflict between the church and the state.”

Ultimately HB 391 was revised to appease the outcry from various church officials. Justice Baker comments:

“After hearing concern from numerous clergy members that the bill would entangle the State in the affairs of the church, the bill was amended to add the specific exceptions now contained in subsections (6)(b) and (6)(c).”

Subsection 6c states: “A member of the clergy or a priest is not required to make a report under this section if the communication is required to be confidential by canon law, church doctrine, or established church practice. “

These added subsections effectively obliterated the mandated clergy reporting statute, adding language so broad that any church could argue that its own definition of confidentiality falls under “established church practice.”

Justice Baker stipulates in her ruling that Jehovah’s Witnesses claim that by narrowly defining confidentiality, they are being discriminated against. The Witnesses are quick to point out that while the Catholic Church has one priest, the Jehovah’s Witnesses have multiple priests- or elders- who are all entitled to the “confidential” details in question. Considering that some congregations have up to 15 or even 20 elders, and the New York Service Department elders are likewise informed, the concept of confidentiality stretches the bounds of reality.

The Supreme Court’s opinion further clarifies why it will not uphold Judge Manley’s ruling against Jehovah’s Witnesses by citing the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment.

“The Establishment Clause ensures that ‘one religious denomination [will] not be officially preferred over another.'”

Given the fact that Jehovah’s Witnesses are known for litigating their Constitutional claims vigorously in the U.S. Supreme Court, it makes one contemplate whether Montana’s highest court simply opted to placate religious freedom laws over the rights of individual victims. It was the legal path of least resistance.

In concluding her Opinion, Justice Baker summarized the unexpected result:

“We hold accordingly that the undisputed material facts in the summary judgment record demonstrate as a matter of law that Jehovah’s Witnesses were not mandatory reporters under § 41-3-201, MCA, in this case because their church doctrine, canon, or practice required that clergy keep reports of child abuse confidential, thus entitling the Defendants to the exception of § 41-3-201(6)(c), MCA. The reporting statute as written accommodates Jehovah’s Witnesses’ definition and practice of confidentiality.” [bold ours]

The obvious question raised here is whether the need to “accommodate” the Jehovah’s Witnesses’ practice of conducting intensive internal child abuse investigations outweighs the duty to report acts of unspeakable sexual abuse to children.

The reaction to this ruling has already generated widespread shock and anger among victims of child abuse and supporters of mandatory reporting law.

In an exclusive statement to JW Survey, plaintiff’s attorney Neil Smith said:

“This is a sad day for victims of child abuse in Montana. Instead of treating individuals and businesses equally in the eyes of the law, this opinion gives preferential treatment to churches, especially the Jehovah’s Witnesses, because it allows the Jehovah’s Witnesses to write their own laws about when they will and will not report child abuse.”

Let’s Not Forget

As the Montana Supreme Court justices navigate the interpretation of the law and the Constitution, let’s not forget what really happened here.

On March 19th, 2004, Lexi Nunez’s aunt Holly wrote a letter to the body of elders of Thompson Falls Montana in which she described horrific and detailed accounts of multiple sexual assaults by her stepfather Max Reyes. This took place over many years, beginning in 1994. After confessing to the abuse of her brother Peter, Max Reyes was disfellowshipped by congregation elders.

The elders wrote that they believed the sexual abuse allegations of Holly and Peter. The elders were aware that Holly’s niece Lexi was in the care of Max Reyes both before Reyes was disfellowshipped, while he was disfellowshipped, and after he was reinstated. Watchtower’s legal department instructed the elders not to report, knowing very well the potential implications of covering up these crimes.

As a result, the cycle of abuse continued, and Lexi was sexually molested by Max Reyes, who fled to Mexico before the 2018 trial.

Let’s never forget that Montana’s law did not prevent elders from contacting the police. It was Watchtower’s legal department which blocked the report.

The law gives religion the opportunity to claim privilege, but it does not require it. Watchtower commands the use of privilege to escape reporting.

The Enigmatic 1998 Report

In reviewing the Montana Supreme Court decision rendered January 8th, it did not go unnoticed that in the opening paragraphs of the opinion, Justice Baker erroneously stipulated to a fact which Watchtower categorically denied from the outset of this case.

Baker writes: “In 1998, Holly told Don Herberger, a local elder at the Thompson Falls Congregation, that her step-father Maximo had inappropriately touched and fondled her.”

The opinion goes on to state the details of the 1998 report, which Watchtower attorney Joel Taylor categorically denied.

[image error]Re-Creation of the handwritten whiteboard “exhibit” used by Joel Taylor

In opening arguments, Taylor told the jury that Holly’s claim that she approached elders in 1998 was a complete fabrication, and that the sole purpose of the claim was to extract monetary damages from Watchtower. In somewhat dramatic fashion, Taylor wrote “1998” on a whiteboard, the drew a line to dollar signs, stating:

“So this 1998 meeting is for one singular purpose. One singular purpose. That’s what it’s for. It didn’t happen. It didn’t happen.”

During deliberations, the jury agreed that there was not sufficient evidence to prove that the 1998 report occurred, which prevented them from awarding Holly McGowan a portion of the judgment.

While testimony and circumstantial evidence clearly suggest that McGowan was telling the truth, the Montana Supreme Court appears to break established legal procedure by taking disputed testimony and presenting it as fact.

The Net Outcome

While there is no question that the Montana Supreme Court ruling has failed the victims and shocked the public, there are a number of important impacts of this case that cannot be ignored.

Following the 2018 judgment against Watchtower, the Montana Legislature adopted a number of changes, described by the Montana Law Review Online:

“During the 2019 legislative session, Governor Bullock signed HB 640, which updated laws relating to childhood sexual abuse, namely Montana’s child abuse reporting statute. The Legislature made the punishment for failure to report sexual abuse a felony, and applied it retroactively”

While the clergy confidentiality exemption still exists, these changes still represent progress.

In 2019, the Montana Trial Lawyers Association honored plaintiffs Holly McGowan and Lexi Nunez with the Citizen of the Year award for their courage and willingness to seek justice and demand accountability.

National media coverage, coupled with the efforts of Nunez, McGowan, and their legal team, has shed considerable light upon the flawed practices of Jehovah’s Witnesses. It has enabled and inspired a notable number of additional survivors of abuse to come forward and speak out, to reclaim their voices amidst a culture of secrecy and cover-up.

[image error]2018-2019 Citizen of the Year Award

Cases like Nunez v. Watchtower have drawn the attention of legislators and top State Attorneys throughout the United States, leading to a reexamination of current law, and has opened up religions like Jehovah’s Witnesses to criminal investigations.

Those criminal investigations will be the subject of upcoming JW Survey articles.

Lexi Nunez Speaks Out

The Montana case is not a win for Watchtower. In the process of dodging a $35 million dollar bullet, they have exposed their arrogant and caustic policies which have muzzled the cries of victims of abuse. You won’t find the Montana ruling on the Jehovah’s Witness website, because the acknowledgment of this ruling is also a concession of their own guilt. So it’s not there.

In respect for the brave women who have courageously stood up to a multi-billion dollar religious empire, JW Survey was honored to speak with Lexi Nunez, to call her our friend, and to give her the final word:

“Please don’t let this case discourage you. Sometimes we have to fail before we succeed but we should not lose heart. To all victims past and present, we see you, we hear you, please, let us help you. Despite what our abusers would have us think, we are not alone! But the only way we fight this is by shining a light on the truth. Be brave and make a difference, not just for yourself but also for other victims who are struggling to find help. Our solidarity comes from the strength in our numbers. Keep fighting!”

-Lexi

[image error]

Resources, Documents, and Media:

Read the Montana Supreme Court Decision HERE

Montana Mandatory Reporting Code HERE

NPR Report: https://www.npr.org/2020/01/09/795019348/montana-court-reverses-35-million-child-abuse-verdict-against-jehovahs-witnesses

[image error]

The JW Survey team discusses the ruling on Episode 30 of Watchtower in Focus:

The post Montana Supreme Court Rules Church Doctrine Trumps Mandatory Abuse Reporting Law, $35M Verdict Against Jehovah’s Witnesses Reversed appeared first on JWsurvey.