Judicial Committee files are kept even after your death at Bethel but local elders are supposed to destroy their local copies after seven years, which some do and others do not. The letters of recommendation that get passed to the next kingdom hall's elders often contain many cruel falsifications, but citizens of the United States are not usually allowed to see either the Judicial Committees file records or the letters-of-recommendation about themselves with this based on the separation of church-and-state.
Those in the European Union it would appear are allowed by EU law to see the documents and I think this may hold true also for Canadian Jehovah's Witnesses. However the Watchtower Society has its "creative" ways of getting around such laws. For example they can advise elders to read a letter or file then destroy it locally although a copy is kept in the U.S. at the Bethel headquarters and the elders in your new kingdom hall simply keep in their minds or "private" notes whatever was said in the orginal documents.
Another clever way to backstab members is for them to say nothing specific about you but to say something like "this brother would greatly benefit from the disciplining applied to Job" or even less specifically "Proverbs ## : ## comes to mind when thinking of this sister." Also they can "confidentially" telephone what they think of you to the next kingdom hall etc.
If you find yourself on the "outs" with the elders in one kingdom hall what may happen is this. They can act so-so to lukewarm nice to you while you are at their kingdom hall, then send a letter recommending you be put under severe discipline at the next hall which gets carried out there for no reason that you can figure out. That next hall's elders may observe or spy on you about six months then start working to "refine" you.
They may not even know whatever it is that the previous elders disliked about you but feel "honor-bound" to act in line with the recommmendations. You will be expected to take the "tough love" treatment the whole time until you move to still another kingdom hall. There, if you do not talk "disloyally" about how the previous hall's elders "mistreated" you or other people but you do pioneer constantly and attend all the meetings, then they might just start giving you a few priveleges.
I cannot say this is done at everyone of the 90,000 or so congregations earthwide, but I can and do say it is done at those that I know of in the United States. It may not hold true for all U.S. congregations but believe me it holds true for all too many. There are good elders but there are also snakes who act nice to your face and gleefully stab you in the back just as Mother Bethel pleases and allows.
Maybe five years ago at a Ministerial Training School in the U.S. elders were told to start administering their own discipline at their own kingdom halls while a person attended there instead of passing along the recommendation that they undergo fire from the next body of elders. This is what was taught "officially" but "unofficially" the word was "you can ignore what was taught because it was just one of those things that was taught for appearances to protect the Governing Body and its staff up in Bethel in Brooklyn."
Yes, there's too much of this that goes on. Hope this helps.
