Courtesy of a member of another group I belong to:
SHOW: Dateline
DATE: May 28, 2002
WITNESS FOR THE PROSECUTION
Announcer: From our studios in New York, here is Jane Pauley.
JANE PAULEY: Good evening. At some point it may stop being
news--each time another person comes forward to say they were
sexually abused as a child by a trusted religious figure--but
not yet, though tonight it’s not priests under fire. In fact,
our story began long before the Catholic Church scandal broke
last January. The scenario of alleged abuse is much the same,
but the consequences of coming forward, for people whose faith
was the center of their lives, would be harsh and profound.
Here’s John Larson.
JOHN LARSON reporting:
In a small town like Othello, Washington, neighbors are often
friends, and friends like family. Which makes the story you’re
about to hear even more painful. Because, for Erica Garza, who
grew up here, there was no one closer, no one she trusted more
than her parents’ best friend.
(Othello; homes; Othello city limit sign; Erica Garza; Manuel
Beliz)
Ms. ERICA GARZA: You would have never known by looking at him,
or by the way he acted what he was doing on the side.
LARSON: (Voiceover) What that friend, Manuel Beliz, was doing
was molesting Erica, sexually abusing her. She says it started
when she was just five years old.
(Photo of Beliz; photo of Erica)
Ms. E. GARZA: I remember it just like it was yesterday.
LARSON: What was your reaction when he first started touching
you?
Ms. E. GARZA: I didn’t know any better.
(Voiceover) I just remember it hurt.
(Photo of Erica)
Ms. E. GARZA: Out of anything, I just remember the hurt.
(From home video) (Unintelligible)...my brother.
LARSON: (Voiceover) A hurt that grew, she says, because her
molester pressured her to keep it all a secret. And while that
may not be surprising, this isn’t a story about a molester
trying to stay in the shadows. This is a story about others
who may have played a role not only in Erica’s abuse, but the
abuse of other victims as well.
(Home video; Beliz; shadow; photo of congregation singing;
people holding hymnals)
Ms. E. GARZA: They didn’t care about what had happened.
Everything they did was trying to hide the facts.
LARSON: (Voiceover) Both Erica and her molester were members
of the same church, Jehovah’s Witnesses.
(Church sign)
(Excerpt shown from Watchtower Society video)
LARSON: (Voiceover) Jehovah’s Witnesses are evangelical
Christians best-known for going door-to-door handing out
Awake! magazine. Jehovah’s Witnesses have six million members
worldwide, and some controversial rules--no birthdays or
Christmas, no blood transfusions, no military service, no
saluting the flag--all of which separates them, sometimes even
isolates them from mainstream America. In fact, in the world
of Jehovah’s Witnesses, anyone outside the church--most of you
watching tonight--are considered part of Satan’s world, a
world which, as depicted in the church’s literature, will be
destroyed by God. True Jehovah’s Witnesses, those who closely
follow the church’s rules, will survive to live forever on a
perfect earth.
But now there are accusations that the church, run out of its
headquarters in New York, called the Watchtower Society, is
covering up cases of child molestation, protecting molesters
and keeping secrets that put children at risk. Consider what
happened to Erica Garza. By the time she was 16, Erica’s
family had moved away from Othello to a new home and new
Kingdom Hall in California where one day she found the courage
to tell her family her terrible secret. And what did her
father, Reuben Garza do?
Report it to the police?
(Excerpts from Watchtower Society video; congregation; members
of congregation; woman being baptized; boy being baptized;
books; artist’s drawings; New York City; Watchtower building;
photos of Erica and others; Kingdom Hall; photo of Erica and
family)
Mr. REUBEN GARZA: No. Never mentioned report it to the police.
(Voiceover) Take care of it in the congregation.
(Kingdom Hall)
LARSON: (Voiceover) Reuben Garza, who was one of the church’s
lay ministers, or “elders,” says that’s precisely what
Jehovah’s Witness leaders had taught him. And so instead of
going to the police, he and his wife, Alexandra, called the
elders back in Othello.
(Photo of Reuben Garza; photo of Garza family)
LARSON: But let me say the obvious. I mean, your daughter’s
been raped. Didn’t you think, ‘I’ve got to go to the cops?’
Ms. ALEXANDRA GARZA: That was my first reaction. But as a
Witness, first you’ve got to go to the elders when you have a problem.
LARSON: (Voiceover) But the elders didn’t go to the police,
either. Why? Well, legally, they didn’t have to. Only 16
states require clergy members to report any and all suspected
child abuse, and Washington state is not one of them. Instead,
church elders opened their own internal investigation. It’s
one of the things that sets Jehovah’s Witnesses apart from
most other religious groups. The church has its own judicial
system.
(Kingdom Hall; swings; Othello; Kingdom Hall)
LARSON: Whenever a church member is accused of doing something
wrong--whether it’s breaking a church rule like smoking,
committing a sin like adultery, or even committing a crime
like rape--the local church appoints a special committee of
elders to investigate the charge. Now, if the accused is found
guilty, they can be reprimanded or, in worst cases, kicked out
of the church, disfellowshipped, potentially cut off from
their friends and family, losing their chance, they believe,
at everlasting life. For a Jehovah’s Witness, there can be no
greater punishment.
(Voiceover) Erica Garza expected her molester would, at the
very least, be disfellowshipped. But after five months of
waiting for the church in Othello to act, she got angry and
did the unthinkable.
Ms. E. GARZA: So I called my elders and I said, ‘Look, I’m
taking it to the police.’
LARSON: What did they say?
Ms. E. GARZA: ‘Don’t. Or else.’
LARSON: Or else what?
Ms. E. GARZA: That’s what I said. I said, ‘Or else what?’ And
he said, ‘Just don’t.’ I said, ‘What? I’ll be disfellowshipped
if I take it to the police? Is that what’s going to happen to
me?’ And he said, ‘Yes. You will be disfellowshipped.’ And I
was just, like, ‘What? You’re going to disfellowship me for
being raped, yet they guy who raped me is still a Jehovah’s
Witness?’ And they said, ‘Don’t. Don’t take it to the police.
You will be condemned by God.’
LARSON: (Voiceover) It was October 1996, and Erica says she
finally decided whatever the penalty, she had to go to the
police. Following an investigation, Manuel Beliz was charged
with molestation and rape.
And the church? Erica says her California Kingdom Hall not
only shunned her, but shunned her family as well.
(Erica; Beliz; Kingdom Hall)
LARSON: What happened?
Mr. GARZA: Was removed as an elder.
LARSON: So they kicked you out.
Mr. GARZA: Yes, they did.
LARSON: (Voiceover) Erica felt abused, abandoned by her church
and alone. But what she couldn’t have known was that it would
be four more years before another Jehovah’s Witness, this
time, an elder 2,000 miles away, would take a special interest
in Erica’s case. The elder had uncovered evidence, he says,
that there were many more victims like Erica within Witness
Kingdom Halls. And now he, too, was about to break with the
church and go outside into what Witnesses believe is the realm
of Satan--the outside world--to expose the church’s secrets.
(Erica; Bill Bowen; meeting schedule)
LARSON: You talking to me right now, it’s like you’re talking
to Satan.
Mr. BILL BOWEN: That’s correct. I’m attacking God, is what
they’ve said about it.
LARSON: In the view of the church, sitting down with us right
now.
Mr. BOWEN: Yes.
LARSON: (Voiceover) Bill Bowen is a candle maker in Kentucky,
and a lifelong Jehovah’s Witness. It all began, he says, about
two years ago when he was filing confidential church records
at the local Kingdom Hall and stumbled on this letter. It
described an admission dating back to the 1980s, a molestation
case that he says the church had swept under the rug.
(Bowen making candles; letter; excerpts from letter)
LARSON: About how old was this child that was involved in this
case?
Mr. BOWEN: As I reviewed the material, it appeared to me she
was about 11 years of age.
LARSON: (Voiceover) And the admitted molester? A man Bowen
knew well, a fellow elder who got only a slap on the wrist
from the church as was never reported to police. Outraged,
Bowen put a message on the Internet to see if there were other
similar cases. The response, he says, was an avalanche of pain
and frustration.
(Congregation singing; Bowen typing; responses on computer
screen)
Mr. BOWEN: These were all Jehovah’s Witnesses that had been
molested and silenced within the church.
LARSON: (Voiceover) Bill Bowen is not saying Jehovah’s
Witnesses have more molesters than any other religious group.
The problem, he says, is how the church handles the cases that
come to its attention. Like the case of Daniel Fitzwater, a
Jehovah’s Witness elder in Nevada. Bowen discovered that
according to the church’s own internal records, church
officials knew of 17 girls who had accused Fitzwater of
molesting them. But police say the church never passed that
information on to them.
Bowen also learned that in New Hampshire Paul Berry beat and
sexually tortured his step-daughter, Holly Brewer, from the
time she was four. But Holly’s mother says that when she
complained to church elders that Berry was beating Holly and
her other kids, the elders told her to be a better wife and to
pray more. She also says they never informed police as
required by state law. The church denies that, saying she
never told them of the abuse. Holly later ran away from home
and says she disfigured herself with tattoos and piercings in
response to the abuse.
(Watchtower building; photo of Daniel Fitzwater; church
records; excerpts from records; photo of Paul Berry; photo of
Holly Brewer; photo of family; Kingdom Hall; photo of Holly)
Ms. HOLLY BREWER: It started out by me internalizing the pain.
It really did. It started by me, ‘I want to mess myself up. I
want to make myself look as ugly I can. I don’t want any guys
to hit on me. I don’t want to be attractive to people.
LARSON: (Voiceover) Both Paul Berry in New Hampshire and
Daniel Fitzwater in Nevada ultimately were convicted of sexual
crimes and are now in prison. But Bill Bowen says many others
in the church accused of sexual abuse have never been reported
to police. It’s a claim he says he’s heard, though not
verified, from several hundred current and former church
members. His conclusion: disturbing to day the least.
(Photos of Berry and Fitzwater; Bowen talking to reporter;
text on computer screen)
Mr. BOWEN: It’s a pedophile paradise within the organization.
I believe that.
LARSON: What’s the danger that you’ve been consumed by this to
the point that--that you’ve blown it all out of proportion? I
mean pedophile paradise? Come on.
Mr. BOWEN: I believe it with all my heart.
(Voiceover) There is a massive problem in the organization.
(Bowen)
LARSON: (Voiceover) But Bill Bowen is just one man in one
congregation in Kentucky. This woman, Barbara Anderson, worked
for a decade inside Jehovah’s Witness headquarters. When
Anderson saw Bowen’s messages on the Internet, she says she
realized she had to tell him there was much more to the story,
involving children in many of the 11,000 congregations across
the country.
(Bowen; Barbara Anderson; letter on computer screen; Anderson)
Ms. BARBARA ANDERSON: I don’t believe that they’re safe within
their church.
LARSON: (Voiceover) Anderson was a researcher at the
Watchtower Society in the early 1990s when a senior official
there asked her to look into the church’s handling of sexual
abuse cases. What she found, she says, sickened her: hundreds
of molestation cases on record, all kept secret in church
files--secret not only from the outside world, but from the
members themselves, the families, the mothers and fathers and
children who trust the church is looking out for them.
(Watchtower building; Anderson; filing cabinets)
Ms. ANDERSON: I believe that if they asked to see the
congregation records, they will find that there are many
envelopes with letters that discuss men--or women--in the
congregation that were accused of molesting a child.
LARSON: (Voiceover) Why would the church want to keep these
cases secret and in-house? Anderson agrees that part of the
problem is the church’s distrust of the outside world, but she
says it’s not that simple. Anderson says when church elders
investigate crimes like child molestation, they follow
instructions that may prevent them from taking action--ancient
instructions taken from the Bible itself.
(Watchtower building; Bible)
Ms. ANDERSON: They basically use a scripture in I Timothy 5:19
that states you’re not to make an accusation against an older
man unless there are two or three witnesses.
LARSON: What are the odds that there are going to be two or
three witnesses to an older man molesting a eight-year-old
girl?
Ms. ANDERSON: No molester is going to have any witnesses,
that’s for sure.
Mr. BOWEN: The sum and total of their investigation will be
going to a pedophile and saying, ‘Did you do it? Nope? Well,
OK. Guess we’d better go on then. Sorry we bothered you.’
(Talking on phone) Did he ask you any questions?
LARSON: (Voiceover) Bill Bowen says if you want to get an idea
of how the church sweeps cases under the rug...
(Bowen talking on phone; traffic on bridges)
Headquarters #1: (On phone) Good afternoon, Watchtower.
LARSON: (Voiceover) ...just listen to part of a conversation
Bowen recorded a little over a year ago with an official in
the Jehovah’s Witness legal department.
(New York City)
Headquarters Receptionist: (On phone) Good afternoon, Legal
Department.
LARSON: (Voiceover) Bowen calls seeking advice on how to
handle a suspected molestation case involving a young girl and
her father. Instead of being told to report it to the police,
Bowen is told to confront the suspected abuser.
(New York City; Bowen talking on phone)
Headquarters #2: (On phone) You just ask him again, ‘Now is
there anything to this?’ If he says ‘No,’ then I would walk
away from it.
Mr. BOWEN: (On phone) Yep.
Headquarters #2: (On phone) Leave it for Jehovah. He’ll bring
it out.
Mr. BOWEN: (On phone) Yep.
Headquarters #2: (On phone) But don’t get yourself in a jam.
LARSON: (Voiceover) Again, there was no insistence that this
matter be brought to the authorities in the outside world.
Bowen says he was so upset by the whole case he resigned as a
church elder and vowed to help abuse victims. He didn’t know
that halfway across the country, Erica Garza as feeling the
same frustration as she prepared to face her molester in
court.
(Bowen and woman; Erica and family)
LARSON: Did any of those elders, any of the people in the
church stand up and speak on your behalf?
Ms. E. GARZA: No.
LARSON: (Voiceover) But Erica Garza was about to find out that
she wasn’t really all alone.
(Announcements)
Announcer: DATELINE NBC, winner of 10 Headliner awards for
excellence in journalism. America’s most watched, most honored
news magazine, DATELINE, will be right back.
(Announcements)
Announcer: From our studios in Rockefeller Center, here is
Stone Phillips.
STONE PHILLIPS: She was just five years old when she says she
was first molested by a respected member of her Jehovah’s
Witnesses congregation. Now a young woman, Erica Garza wants
justice. She says church leaders threatened to expel her if
she went to the police, but she went anyway and now her
alleged attacker is on trial for molestation and rape. Here
with the conclusion to our story, John Larson.
LARSON: (Voiceover) Erica Garza’s accused molester, Manuel
Beliz, showed up in court with plenty of support.
(Courthouse; empty court room)
Ms. GARZA: (Voiceover) His side was full of Jehovah’s
Witnesses.
(Empty court room)
Ms. GARZA: People I thought were my friends, but they were
there to support him. And on my side was my family.
LARSON: (Voiceover) Even though Beliz had apparently confessed
his crimes before church elders, it appeared to make little
difference. He was expelled from the church, but only
temporarily. Elders allowed him to rejoin the church before
the trial. John White, the congregation’s top elder, explained
at a court hearing.
(Beliz and man; entering courthouse; John White)
Mr. JOHN WHITE: (From audio tape) We’re satisfied that he was
repentant and could be admitted to the congregation again. To
us, we don’t see a problem.
LARSON: (Voiceover) White also told the court that when a
church member is called before the elders and admits to a
crime, they consider it a religious confession and that, just
like a priest or rabbi, he and other elders have good reason
not to testify about it in court.
(Empty court room)
Mr. WHITE: (From audio tape) Jehovah’s Witnesses do not want
to harbor criminals or dangerous people. But we want the
confidentiality because if that’s taken away from us, why
should a person ever confess anything?
LARSON: Did anybody say, ‘We understand the pain that this
girl has gone through?’
Ms. E. GARZA: They say we--they feel sorry for me.
LARSON: (Voiceover) Even without the church’s help or the
testimony of elders who, Erica says, knew what had happened,
in August of 1998 Manuel Beliz was convicted, guilty on two
counts of rape and two counts of child molestation. He was
sentenced to 11 1/2 years in prison, but two years into his
term, his conviction was overturned on a technicality over how
the jury had been selected. Erica had stood up, faced her
abuser, even challenged her church, but now he was being let
out of prison.
(Kingdom Hall; photo of Beliz; jail; empty court room; Erica)
Ms. E. GARZA: I was so disappointed, I was sad, I was
heartbroken and I didn’t know what to do.
LARSON: (Voiceover) Manuel Beliz was released from prison to
await a new trial. Last summer DATELINE found him back at the
Kingdom Hall, about to join others going door-to-door,
evangelizing for the church.
(Beliz)
Ms. E. GARZA: It just makes me so sad because I was raped and
I was--I’m being shunned, and he raped me and--and he’s being
loved. It just--it--it gives me chills up my spine just to
think about it.
LARSON: (Voiceover) How do Jehovah’s Witness leaders respond
to complaints that they’re trying to bury cases like Erica’s?
They declined a request for an on-camera interview, but spoke
to us off camera, and provided us with a videotaped policy
statement by spokesman J.R. Brown.
(Watchtower building; excerpt from videotape)
Mr. J.R. BROWN: (From videotape) Jehovah’s Witnesses feel
child abuse is an evil. It’s an evil of our time, it’s an evil
in our society and so we abhor it.
LARSON: (Voiceover) Church officials say they publish articles
like this, educating members and training elders how to help
abuse victims. The church also says elders are required to
investigate any allegations of abuse, and steps are taken to
protect alleged victims from further abuse. And while
officials acknowledge that molesters who repent are readmitted
to church, they say known molesters are not allowed to hold a
position of responsibility within the church. They also insist
that the church complies with all laws on reporting abuse in
those states where it’s required, even when there’s only one
witness to the crimes. But in states where churches are not
required to report, they say they do not discourage victims
from reporting abuse to authorities.
(Magazine articles; church name on building; congregation
singing)
Mr. BROWN: (From videotape) When it comes to the matter of
reporting, then that’s something the parents can decide. We
certainly never tell them not to report a case of child
molestation.
LARSON: (Voiceover) In a letter to DATELINE, the church’s
general council adds that "it is possible that a few of the
77,799 elders of Jehovah’s Witnesses have not followed the
direction that they have been given regarding investigating
and reporting child abuse."
(Letters; excerpts from letters)
LARSON: What remains unanswered, though, is why the church
gets involved at all with investigating what are criminal
matters. And just how often do they turn one of their own into
authorities? We asked the church for some examples, proof that
they’re as tough as they say they are on members who abuse
children. The church waited six months, but finally offered us
two cases. And right away we noticed something. In both cases,
the victims were Jehovah’s Witnesses, but their alleged
molesters were not. They were non-believers from outside the
church.
(Voiceover) In fact, we could only find two cases where the
church took an active role in turning in one of its own,
including the case of this man, Clement Pandello.
(Clement Pandello)
Offscreen Voice: Mr. Pandello...
LARSON: (Voiceover) Pandello, seen here in family videos...
(Excerpts from family videos)
Unidentified Girl: (From home video) ...in the middle.
LARSON: (Voiceover) ..confessed to church elders he’d molested
his own granddaughter.
(Excerpts from family videos)
Mr. CLEMENT PANDELLO: (From video) Have to kick you out of
school if they put one in your head.
LARSON: (Voiceover) How did the church handle it? The parents
of the young victim, Pandello’s own son and daughter-in-law,
also Jehovah’s Witnesses, told DATELINE the church pressured
to agree to a deal in which Pandello pled guilty to criminal
sexual contact and endangering the welfare of a child. He was
given only probation, no jail time. And what did the church
elders tell Barbara and Carl Pandello?
(Excerpts from family videos; Carl and Barbara Pandello
walking on beach; excerpts from family video)
Mr. CARL PANDELLO: We should just let it go, that it’s not
Jehovah’s time to deal with it.
LARSON: (Voiceover) The church says that’s not true, and the
church apparently did disfellowship Clement Pandello two
separate times. But each time they welcomed him back. So where
is this convicted child molester today, a man who, according
to court records, has admitted molesting girls all his life?
DATELINE found him going door-to-door, a Jehovah’s Witness in
good standing, evangelizing to people who know nothing about
his record. His own son, Carl, says the church should know
better.
(Clement)
Mr. CARL PANDELLO: He’s a sexual predator. When he goes
door-to-door, he has a craving for young, juvenile girls, as
he puts it. He’s looking at that child, having those immoral
thoughts in his mind while he’s there.
LARSON: You know the church now says they don’t have a special
problem. It’s a societal problem and they do everything they
can to stop pedophiles from hurting children within the
Jehovah’s Witness church. What do you say to them?
Ms. E. GARZA: Liars.
LARSON: (Voiceover) Even though her accused rapist had been
freed on a technicality, Erica Garza was not about to let him
off the hook. Last summer, nearly five years after she first
came forward, Erica headed back to court. Once again, not one
Jehovah’s Witness from her former church came to support her.
But this time, she wasn’t alone.
(Beliz; Erica and others)
Mr. BOWEN: ...comments we’ve made from all over the country...
LARSON: (Voiceover) That out-spoken elder from Kentucky, Bill
Bowen, was there.
(Erica talking to Bowen)
Mr. BOWEN: Just to even things.
LARSON: (Voiceover) And Bowen had set up a new support group
for sexually abused Jehovah’s Witnesses. And more than 20
people who had heard about the case through his Web site were
there to support Erica.
Ms. GARZA: Thank you, everybody, for being here.
These are people who don’t know me, who flew from all over the
place for me, to be there for me because they realize, ‘Hey,
you didn’t do anything wrong.’ And it was so encouraging to
see people there for me...
(Voiceover) ...as opposed for him.
(People entering court house)
LARSON: (Voiceover) In court, Manuel Beliz took the stand. He
denied molesting Erica, but did admit touching her
inappropriately. Once again, Beliz was found guilty.
(Empty court room; photo of Beliz)
Ms. E. GARZA: Guilty, guilty, guilty, guilty.
LARSON: (Voiceover) Erica Garza says she has found justice in
spite of her church.
(Erica, Reuben and Alexandra coming out of courthouse)
Ms. E. GARZA: Oh, I can’t believe it. On all four counts.
Mr. GARZA: Just a little bit of justice. You deserve it.
Ms. E. GARZA: Thank you, God. Thank you, Lord.
LARSON: (Voiceover) Her molester has been sent to prison for
11 1/2 years.
Ms. E. GARZA: Thank you for all your help, Bill.
Mr. BOWEN: Everything’s over.
Ms. ANDERSON: You’ll sleep well tonight, won’t you?
Ms. E. GARZA: Yeah.
LARSON: (Voiceover) All Erica wants now, she says, is for the
church to change its policy and give molestation victims
simple advice.
Ms. E. GARZA: ‘Take it to the police.’ Hey, encourage me to
take it to the police. Don’t tell me not to.
PHILLIPS: Erica Garza and Holly Brewer are both suing the
Watchtower Society and their local congregations. The church
is fighting the lawsuits. The church also told DATELINE that
while some known pedophiles still go door-to-door, they are
not allowed to do alone.
Finally, four of the people DATELINE interviewed--former Elder
Bill Bowen, Barbara Anderson and Carl and Barbara
Pandello--are facing possible expulsion from their
congregations.
Keep the Faith
RAY