states' rights - Utah and Arizona
(posted this article since original link is dead)
March 1, 2023
'In the wake of the AP’s investigation last year, Republican state Rep. Phil Lyman and Democratic Rep. Angela Romero announced plans to reform Utah’s clergy-penitent privilege loophole. Lyman, who served six years as a Latter-day Saints’ bishop, said at the time lawmakers should want to reexamine the loophole “regardless of religious or political affiliation.”
“People should be able to go and confess their sins to their bishop without fear of being prosecuted up until when they are confessing something that has affected someone’s else life significantly,” he told the AP in August.'
"... churches have maintained the same playbook for decades in opposing more disclosure.
Routinely it involves a two-pronged approach, defending clergy-penitent privilege in statehouses and using it to avoid damaging disclosures in court cases, said Hamilton, also a University of Pennsylvania law professor.
“They have not veered from it. Both institutions are hoping that time will simply let everybody start trusting them again,” Hamilton said, referring to Catholics and Latter-day Saints.
But, she added, “by preventing the public — and especially the sincere believers — from getting the full story you don’t create the accountability that these organizations should be held to and the secrets continue.”
“The problem in the United States — and this is particularly acute in state like Utah — is that the lobbying power of these religious organizations is so extraordinary,” Hamilton said.'
https://apnews.com/article/mormon-clergy-abuse-reporting-utah-ca56260080476c4c99cd6359bd3742f3
Court cites clergy-penitent privilege in dismissing child sex abuse lawsuit against Mormon church
November 8, 2023
An Arizona judge has dismissed a high-profile child sexual abuse lawsuit against The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, ruling that church officials who knew that a church member was sexually abusing his daughter had no duty to report the abuse to police or social service agencies because the information was received during a spiritual confession.
In a ruling on Friday, Cochise County Superior Court Judge Timothy Dickerson said the state’s clergy-penitent privilege excused two bishops and several other officials with the church, widely known as the Mormon church, from the state’s child sex abuse mandatory reporting law because Paul Adams initially disclosed during a confession that he was sexually abusing his daughter.
“Church defendants were not required under the Mandatory Reporting Statute to report the abuse of Jane Doe 1 by her father because their knowledge of the abuse came from confidential communications which fall within the clergy-penitent exception,” Dickerson wrote in his decision.
Although the church excommunicated Adams, its decision to withhold his abusive behavior from civil authorities allowed him to continue abusing his daughter for seven years, during which he began abusing a second daughter, starting when she was just 6 weeks old.
Lynne Cadigan, an attorney representing the Adams children who filed the 2021 lawsuit, said she will appeal the ruling. “How do you explain to young victims that a rapist’s religious beliefs are more important than their right to be free from rape?” she asked. Cadigan also said the ruling, if allowed to stand, would “completely eviscerate the state’s child protection law.”
