by cappytan 15 Replies latest jw experiences
The press is reporting that over 1,000 cases of abuse were hidden from authorities in Australia.
Australia has around 68,000 publishers.
If you that ratio applied to the U.S. also, there could be over 14,700 cases that were covered up here.
If the ratio held the same worldwide, that would be over 117,600 cases.
Just let that sink in a little.
Cappytan, it's much worse than that. That's 1006 case files. Each pedophile may have abused more than one child.
"During the investigation of this case study, Watchtower Australia produced some 5,000 documents pursuant to summonses issued by the Royal Commission on 4 and 28 February 2015. Those documents include 1,006 case files relating to allegations of child sexual abuse made against members of the Jehovah’s Witness Church in Australia since 1950 – each file for a different alleged perpetrator of child sexual abuse"
And these are just cases that were reported.
And these are just cases that were reported.
Of course there must be thousands of cases that were not reported to the elders.
But what about even those that were reported to the elders?
There are 1006 cases that the Australia branch knows about & has records on.
Current instructions are to "call the branch immediately" upon even an allegation of abuse, but that was not the policy until some time in the 90's.
What about all the cases prior to then that were reported to elders, but the judicial committee determined that the accused was "truly repentant"?
In such a case, the accused would get a mere "private reproof". No record of anything whatsoever would have been reported to the branch.
In my experience, for every case ending in disfellowshipping, there are at least 3 or 4 that end in "reproof" only.
1950's, 1960's, 1970's, 1980's, 1990's.......how many thousands of other child abuse cases were met with "reproof only" and the branch had (has) absolutely no friggin' idea?
The 1006 case files include 190 who received reproof only. 11 of those received reproof multiple times.
Can I just clarify something sir82 - are you saying that those must be after a change of policy in the 90s, and that prior to then there would be absolutely no record held by a branch office if someone was merely reproved for a serious sexual crime?
Absolutely on this is just those which were reported and then ended up in case file. This is minimum numbers really. And in such a relatively small community.
are you saying that those must be after a change of policy in the 90s, and that prior to then there would be absolutely no record held by a branch office if someone was merely reproved for a serious sexual crime?
Sometime in the 90's (if I weren't so lazy I'd look up the exact date - maybe late 80's even?) there was written direction to call the branch before doing anything when an allegation of child abuse was made.
Prior to that, there was no such direction. An allegation of child abuse was handled jut like any other "serious sin" such as smoking a cigarette or getting drunk or committing adultery.
If someone faces a judicial committee for smoking a cigarette or getting drunk or committing adultery, and is found "truly repentant" and is only reproved, no report at all is made to the branch.
Hence, for decades, if someone was accused of child abuse but not DF'ed, the branch would have no idea.
My guess is that those 190 reproof cases all occurred after the change in policy.
Thank you.
edit: so to add to those 190 would be the 125 who didn't receive any form of judicial committee due to the two witness rule. So 215 minimum since they started to collect records of those ones, and it doesn't include those df'd nor those who were never reported at all. Starting to see from their own records just how bad they've allowed this to become, and how many people's lives have been affected because they failed to even meet the most basic duty of care. I know Bill Bowen raised this many years ago, but they've managed to evade revealing it in the States to date even if it costs them cash to try to keep it quiet.
I know for certain that every wensday the service dept has child abuse comitee and they meet every week to talk about new reports.
I think you are right Cappy am thinking the number is closer to 200,000.
