by jwleaks 212 Replies latest watchtower child-abuse
Billy,
I thought the same thing. This is one apostate (tm) that will not be silenced. When this breaks, and I hope it's huge, I will simply say, " Whatever a man is sowing, this he will also reap." Then it's up to the personal integrity and honesty of the individual. Water finds it's own level, as they say.
Billy the Ex-Bethelite - "After reading this, I can't help but believe that the District Convention talks about 'apostates' are an effort to pressure the sheeple into ignoring all the bad publicity around this and other cases that Watchtower is losing."
Oh, for sure.
That and the fact that XJWs have - by and large - become a lot more skilled and sophisticated at spreading TTATT effectively these days (we finally figured out that protest signs outside Assembly Hall gates don't really accomplish anything except feed the R&F's collective persecution complex, LOL).
The XJW activist community has found its legs, IMO.
I also think that the WT heirarchy - on some level - wants to push out the "lukewarm" and bring the overall membership size down to a more manageable level; better to have 2-4 million hardcore followers (that can still support the institution) than 7-8 million half-assed mooks (who just coast along)...
And I say this as a former half-assed mook.
Read it. . . I hate to use the term "slam dunk", but this seems like a slam dunk. I read WTs brief, and it pales in comparison.
They are in trouble.
BILLYTHEEX - What drama announces a "ban"? This years DC? I'd like to see this. . .
I would like to expound a little on the money aspect of this whole thing....
They love to say wait on Jehovah, or trust in the organization, man is imperfect so we have to wait and rely on Jehovah's wisdom. This is a conversation I have with my Elder father about just trusting in God and DO THE RIGHT THING!!!!
For eample, if they really trusted in God then they would not have to worry about money or membership for he would preserve them no matter what. They should just pay the money and their God would just replenish their coffers cause he will preserve this so called true religion.
Same with associating with people who just choose not to be in it anymore. If they changed that they would loose a lot of members but God would help them through it.
They KNOW that they cant do that because it would probably end them showing no favor from ANY God. They have no faith in the God they promote.
Hope this Judge rules in favor of Candace.
Just from reading the first day's transcript from the trial, I felt like my blood pressure was going to spike. I don't think I can read any more about it without self-destructing. I'd been curious about--and had never really done much by way of research on--this issue of child abuse in the WT. I actually saw the old Dateline special back when it came out, and I was still a JW back then. It disturbed me, but...I somehow shrugged it off (despite secretly visiting the Silent Lambs website at that time. I think I knew something wasn't right with the religion but I was afraid to act on it at the time). But this trial really impressed upon me just how much the Society is capable of for the sake of self-preservation. It's chilling.
I'm thinking I should stop reading it for the sake of my health, and yet after reading the first day, I very much want to read all the rest of the trial. (sigh) Did anyone read the whole thing? How on earth did you handle it?
--sd-7
SD-7 - I read the whole thing. How did I handle it ? I just realize that the WT Society is a criminal organization and mind control cult masquerading as a religion. WT leaders only motive is preserving the organization finacially and other ways at all costs by unethical and immoral means. Even if it's by throwing abused children under the bus. It's digusting- but very eye opening confirming what many of us have known for years about this organization. Peace out, mr. Flipper
Thanks JW Leaks.
Bangalore
Good to go bravo!
http://community.beliefnet.com/go/thread/view/43851/29365013/?pg=last#533139347
FYI, if anyone wants to read the Appeal briefs, they are available HERE.
A few days ago, the Conti side filed their response to Watchtower's and N. Freemont Congregation's Opening Briefs.
Discussion about it HERE.
Ok, fine. I'll respond to the “invitation.” If “AnnOMaly” can listen to the facts speak and put aside the usual spin attorneys put on everything, I assume others can also.
Conti v. Watchtower – Respondent’s Brief prepared by Rick Simons
INTRODUCTION
Plaintiff Jane Doe (Candace Conti) was nine years old when the elders of defendant North Fremont Congregation of Jehovah’s Witnesses (“Congregation”) repeatedly assigned her to participate with Jonathan Kendrick, a man known to them as a child molester, in the Congregation’s door-to-door ministry known as “field service.” For nearly two years, Kendrick took advantage of this opportunity, taking Candace to his home where he repeatedly sexually abused her.
An elder does not necessarily conduct the fifteen minute meeting before “field service.” In fact, you don't even have to be a ministerial servant to do so. A baptized publisher, even a sister can conduct the meeting if there are no brothers present. People often make their own plans without coordinating with the service conductor and often have prearranged plans as to who they're going to work with before they arrive.
If Kendrick was “assigned” to a car group during the fifteen minute meeting before field service, he was assigned to work with the parents.
Jury Trial Day 1
Mr. Mccabe: Would you ever assign back in the 1990s a single male to work with a single female in a car to go alone?
Mr. Abrahamson: No. That would not be appropriate.
Mr. Mccabe: Would you ever assign someone's child to work with another adult member of the congregation, let's say a member of the opposite sex, back in the 1990s?
Mr. Abrahamson: No.
Mr. Mccabe: Why not?
Mr. Abrahamson: It wouldn't be appropriate.
Jury Trial Day 4
Mr. Mccabe: Did you ever see Candace Conti come to field service without one or both of her parents?
Carolyn Martinez: No
The only way Jonathon Kendrick would have been able to take the plaintiff to his home, is if the plaintiff's parents gave Kendrick explicit permission to take their daughter off in a car by himself. If this did indeed happen, such a thing had nothing to do with the door-to-door ministry. The door-to-door ministry does not allow an opportunity for the exploitation of a minor. Not while their parents and other adults are in eye-shot.
6. Social and financial burdens.
Congregation paints a doomsday picture of what it terms the “extremely burdensome” responsibility of protecting its members and their children from further acts of molestation by a known child molester in their Congregation. (NFC AOB 40.) The Congregation’s scenario is highly exaggerated. The actual burden and can be summed up in three minor responsibilities:
1. Actually keep a “watchful eye” on the molester (which defendants claim was done anyway),
2. don’t send a known child molester out into church activities with a vulnerable child, and
3. use the power Elder Abrahamson admitted he had to inform parents of the presence of a known child molester.
1. Actually keep a “watchful eye” on the molester (which defendants claim was done anyway),
Who's to say this wasn't done?
The testimony of eye-witnesses: a pretrial memorandum was filed along with every witness during the actual jury trial that revealed testimony contrasting the plaintiff's claims.
Watchtower and North Fremont Congregation's Trial Memorandum Filed 05-18-12
There is no other witness who will corroborate plaintiffs allegations of abuse in this case. In fact, the evidence from other witnesses contradicts certain allegations of Plaintiff. Her father, Neal Conti, will testify that he never allowed plaintiff to leave the Kingdom Hall with Kendrick. Because his wife, plaintiffs mother, Kathleen Conti, had been abused as a child, he was very careful and vigilant in protecting his daughter from such things. He also denies ever allowing plaintiff to sit on Kendrick's lap at the Kingdom Hall. Plaintiffs mother, Kathleen Conti, denied ever allowing plaintiff to sit on Kendrick's lap at the Kingdom Hall. She also vehemently denied allowing Kendrick to take plaintiff to his home from the meetings at the Kingdom Hall. The elders will testify that they kept a close watch on Kendrick after he was removed as a ministerial servant (the removal was in December 1993). They made sure that he did not pay inappropriate attention to children in the Kingdom Hall. They will confirm that they never saw plaintiff leave the Kingdom Hall with Kendrick. In fact, if they had seen such conduct, they would have put a stop to it. Similarly, they never saw Kendrick bear hugging plaintiff or having plaintiff sit on his lap at the Kingdom Hall. Several persons who were members of the congregation at the time of the alleged abuse of plaintiff will testify that they never saw plaintiff, a 9, 10, or 11 year-old-girl, sitting on Kendrick's lap. They will add that they would have found such conduct to be inappropriate. Similarly, they will testify that they never saw plaintiff being taken from the Kingdom Hall by Kendrick, and that they would have considered such conduct even more inappropriate and upsetting. They will point out that they would have notified the elders of it if they had ever seen it happening.
I take it, a nine year old girl sitting in the lap of an unrelated thirty to forty year old man is not the social norm in most church auditoriums. All parents and adults I know would concur. Parents with a history of child abuse and subsequent awareness, or any parent(s) for that matter allowing a male non-relative take their minor daughter off alone is not normal.
2. don’t send a known child molester out into church activities with a vulnerable child, and
The only activities that are relevant are activities where children are separated from their parents.
05-18-12 Miscellaneous Deft. Watchtower and North Fremont Congregation's Trial Memorandum Filed
Within the Jehovah's Witnesses faith, there is no "Sunday School," "church camp," or other children's activities in which children are separated from their parents. The parents of children in the congregation are expected to guide, direct and attend to the needs of their children. The elders are there to give spiritual guidance and direction and any other practical assistance possible, but the parents are there to monitor and discipline their children. Jehovah 's Witness children are not separated from their parents for any spiritual programs or activities.
In such activities, a child isn't “vulnerable.” There are many organizations that host formal and recreational activities on public property where parents are welcome or encouraged to bring their children provided they're properly supervised.
http://www.wpcdenver.org/ministries/mission-and-volunteer-opportunities
Church Volunteer Opportunities
Wellshire Presbyterian Church offers church volunteer opportunities in Denver, Colorado and around the world.
We are a “missional church,” meaning we believe the Holy Spirit is creatively active throughout the world, and we are called to share in God’s work. Through church missions and other volunteer work, we discover our common humanity and share “concrete experiences of seeing Christ in the guise of a stranger.”
No such activities has ever had any connection to a lawsuit. The only activities associated with a lawsuit involving a rank-and-file member, are activities where children are separated from their parents.
In a lawsuit involving the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and the American Boy Scouts, Lawyers for Kerry Lewis, 38, the victim who filed the lawsuit, argued the Boy Scouts organization was reckless for allowing former assistant Scoutmaster Timur Dykes to continue to associate with the victim's Scout troop as a Boy Scout Volunteer after Dykes acknowledged to a bishop for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints early in 1983 that he had molested 17 Boy Scouts. The LDS church was the charter organization for an estimated third to one half of the Boy Scout troops in the nation in the 1980s and remains a charted organization to this day.
Boyscouts are completely separated from their parents during activities associated with this organization.
3. use the power Elder Abrahamson admitted he had to inform parents of the presence of a known child molester.
After the national sex-offender registry administered by the federal government was made accessible to the general public in 1996, some churches have reserved the right to publicize convictions, but not until several years later. Jehovah's Witnesses have enacted such a policy (October 1, 2012 BOE letter). For example, this periodical was published in 2012, a leading insurer of worship centers and related institutions in the United States.
https://www.churchmutual.com/dsp/dsp_RiskReporter.cfm?riskReporterID=61&page=feature
Disclosure
Another factor that religious organizations should consider when developing a sex offender policy is whether to disclose the identity of the sex offender to the congregation. Maia Christopher, executive director of the Association for the Treatment of Sexual Abusers (ATSA), advises religious organizations to provide some level of disclosure and communications to their congregations. Identification
For congregations wondering how to find out if they have convicted sex offenders in their midst, Blanford recommends conducting some simple research. All states have an online sex offender public registry that is freely available to search. These registries exist to inform the public of the identity and whereabouts of all registered offenders.
Whatever an organization's position is on this, it's not anything they can be sued over. No one ever has been. This is because for all practical purposes the person has already been identified.
Settlement Conference Statement of The North Congregation of Jehovah's Witnesses, Fremont California Filed 04-19-12
Discussion of Liability Issues
Settlement Issues
If Plaintiff was abused, it was committed by Kendrick, a third party not under the control or supervision of the Church Defendants. Kendrick denies abusing Plaintiff. Further, even if, arguendo the jury should find that Kendrick abused Plaintiff in the Kingdom Hall by hugging her and having her sit on his lap while her parents were present, the damages for that alleged conduct would be minimal at best. Also, if the jury finds the Church Defendants liable for abuse of Plaintiff off of Kingdom Hall property (such as in Kendrick's private home), the Church Defendants will have little option except to appeal such a verdict. The Church Defendants could not let such a potential precedent go unchallenged. Finally, Plaintiffs description of the location, nature, and extent of her alleged abuse is contradicted by, among other things, her parents and the elders and thus lacks credibility. No demand for a settlement has yet been made by Plaintiff; however, the Church Defendants will participate in the mandatory settlement conference in good faith.
The above circumstances are unprecedented in the legal community. Nothing like this has ever been criteria for liability in any civil lawsuit.
In 2004, the plaintiff's attorney, Rick Simons was appointed "Plaintiffs' Liaison Counsel" in the Coordination Proceedings involving Northern California cases arising from sexual abuse of children by priests of the Roman Catholic Church and other clergy.
Why doesn't Rick Simons attack the Roman Catholic Church over the actions of rank-and-file members?
Is the reason why he does not because he knows such a lawsuit will never see the light of day, whereas the likeliness of a lawsuit attacking a minority religion like Jehovah's Witnesses can possibly result in some success?
Answering such questions is a reliable way to judge whether a person is genuine or strictly has a profit motive.
