Interesting Link on Pedophile Database

by worldlygirl 16 Replies latest watchtower child-abuse

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  worldlygirl

  I received this link in an e-mail today:

  http://www.interlogy.com/products/netcard/cards/Watchtower_Bible_and_Tract_Society_-_Jehovahs_Witnesses.htm

  This is the text of the article. Is that number at the bottom the WTBTS???

  23720 Jehovahs Witness Child Molesters on file Inside sources reveal 23,720 reported/unreported child molesters on file at Jehovah?s Witness headquarters in New York In the spring of 2002, I was contacted by three different sources who claimed to have connected with people inside the headquarters of the Watchtower Bible & Tract Society of New York, located in Patterson , New York . These insiders provided my contacts with a computer data base number of 23,720 child molesters on file there. The files labeled as the ?specialized shepherding arrangement? is a front for reporting child molesters to home office. Patterson is the location for the Service and Legal Departments of the Watchtower Bible and Tract Society of New York, now calling itself the Christian Congregation of Jehovah's Witnesses of New York, and it is in these two departments where these highly confidential files are kept. It is interesting to note the ramifications of this extraordinary number. When a pedophile is revealed within a congregation of Jehovah's Witnesses, the Body of Elders appoints two of their number to investigate the allegation to see if there is any substance to the charge. If the claim is established upon investigation, then the local Body of Elders appoints two of their number to call Watchtower's Legal Department to report the matter. The Legal Department representative then fills out a computerized form using a question and answer format over the telephone. All details of the matter are recorded, including the date of birth of the pedophile; what occurred; the age of the victim; where, when, and how many times the victim was touched, etc.. These details are then put into a computer at home office for permanent record and can be recalled by those authorized at any time if there is a future infraction. At the end of a one to two hour interview, the spokesman in Legal then puts an in-house Watchtower attorney on the phone to determine if the State where thecongregation is located is a reporting State. If it is, then the attorney will encourage the elders to request that parents, caregivers for the victim report the matter. If they do not want to do this, then the elders are required to do so. What if the molestation occurred in one of the thirty-six non-reporting States? Then the attorney will say, -Brothers your obligation has been fulfilled you are to remain neutral on reporting to law enforcement.- At this point, in most cases, the matter is not reported. The original brother will then list Body of Elders' letters discussing child molestation that the elders must review. He also gives instructions that if any new matters develop as to the accused, that is, if this person molests more children, the elders are to use the date of the first report as a reference point or the child molester's date of birth. This then means Watchtower's Legal Department can easily pull up the case on computer and add the new molestation information for the data base. The number of 23,720 is significant, to say the least. If we apply this to the entire worldwide organization, then the figure would be one Jehovah?s Witness out of two hundred and sixty is a child molester on file at their headquarters. Do you think Catholics have such a high ratio of pedophile priests among their priesthood? If we applied a similar ratio to the number of Catholics in the USA at 60,000,000, it would mean there are 1,428,571 Catholic child molesters in this country. It would appear unrealistic to believe this type of ratio could exist in the Catholic Church. Yet with Jehovah?s Witnesses the ratio could be far worse when you consider that many Jehovah?s Witness child molesters may not be reported to Watchtower Legal. If two elders who investigate an allegation are not able to establish the matter at the mouth of -two eye witnesses- will the ?specialized shepherding arrangement? see anything recorded at Patterson , New York ? Please note in the letter to all Body of Elders in England , dated June 1, 2001 , this comment: -There are, however, many other situations that are connected with the abuse of a child. For example, there may be just one eyewitness, and the brother denies the allegation. (Deuteronomy 19:15; John 8:17) Then again, a young child might be abused by someone who himself is a minor, perhaps in his pre- or early-teens. In these and similar cases no entry will be made on the Child Protection List. Rather, information should be kept in a sealed envelope in the congregation's confidential file as described below. When such individuals move, the Congregation Service Committee should write a letter addressed to the Society's Legal Department seeking advice as to whether to communicate the details to the new congregation.- This appears to indicate that the local congregations keep the information and only if the accused molester moves would any consideration be given to check with Watchtower Legal or even alerting the new congregation. Are these individuals considered part of the 23,720 molesters on file? If not, then the logical conclusions would be that there are far more accused child molesters than the 23,720 on file who have either confessed or been convicted at the mouth of -two eye witnesses.- Taking into account the number of 93,000+ congregations worldwide, a conservative estimate would mean one child molester for every four congregations, based on the 23,720 figure. Do you think Jehovah's Witnesses have a problem with child molesters? How many unreported child molesters are operating within the organization and are yet to be revealed? This number will only grow and continue to expose children to danger since Watchtower's policy of keeping molester's names confidential has created a -pedophile paradise.- Why do Jehovah's Witnesses keep a data base of child molesters that in large part is never reported to police? The protection of money not children is the basic reason. The purpose of the data base is to monitor and prevent persons Jehovah's Witnesses have determined to be child moelsters in their membership from serving in official capacity in the congregation. This in turn protects Watchtower Inc. from facing litigation for negligance for putting molesters in a leadership positions which could cost the organization money in the courts. The protection of children remains the lowest priority as this data base remains confidential from the congregation and many of the people that are kept on file will continue to molest children with the protection of -church- confidentiality. One can only wonder how the FBI would react if they knew that such files of criminal activity exist, and that the majority of molestation accusations are not reported to the authorities for investigation. Finally, how easily could the American justice system handle prosecution of several thousand Jehovah's Witness pedophiles? These questions, as well as others, will become a factor when the ?Christian Congregation of Jehovah?s Witnesses? is forced to reveal how many of the alleged 23,720 criminals are being protected by Watchtower policies. 23,720 JW Child Molesters and counting Watchtower Bible and Tract Society

  
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  czarofmischief

  Okay, that number is ridiculously high - I cannot fathom how such a number could possibly be real. what is the source of that number.

  I mean, yes, a lot of incidents, all RIGHT, but is this number 27 thousand actual different people alive right NOW, or 27 thousand incidents over the last thirty years?

  It's still way high, but if there were 27,000 active Jehovah's Witnesses who were pedophiles, that would bespeak an illness of epidemic proportions!

  CZAR
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  Pistoff

  The WT has commented on this through JR Brown; I don't have the quotes but I am sure they can be searched here or elsewhere.

  They have said that the number is "greatly exaggerated". I don't know what that means, but I do know that the source for this info is very confident of it's veracity.

  Is it for the US alone? All of north and south America? Don't know, and I don't think anyone else does either. If there are 90,000 congregations worldwide this puts an abuser in every third or fourth congregation; if for the US and Europe only, then the number is much higher.

  The point, I think, is not the number but the existence of such a database and it's implications.

  It means that the WT has an elaborate legal method, note *not a moral or ethical one*, to deal with accused pedophiles without contacting the police outright. The steps involved reveal a legalistic mindset, rather than one that confronts the issue head on. If someone is accused, and the elders said: Call the police, and let them sort it out, it would do two things: Inhibit false accusations, true, but more importantly, put the investigation into the hands of someone who KNOWS WHAT THEY ARE DOING!

  The elders, by the society's description, are unpaid volunteers. That means that the WT does not want the elders to deal with the truthfulness of any accusation, really; they pay lip service to the 2 witness policy but in reality they will accept 1 witness in some cases, when it suits them.

  This policy is all about limiting legal exposure, and protecting the public reputation of the org. NOT victims. Victims of abuse are told to be quiet, not to talk to anyone including the police if there are not 2 witnesses.
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  Big Tex

  They have said that the number is "greatly exaggerated".

  That statment made me think of an old Saturday Night Live skit about Three Mile Island. During a press conference the head of the NRC (John Belushi if I remember right) was asked if the radiation leakage could kill 100,000 people. He replied, "That's absurd. That number is completely wrong." Then he was asked if the figure were closer to 90,000. He replied, "No comment."

  So I wonder if the figure were put at say, 22,000 if it would still elicit the same response.
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  Lady Lee

  In the Dateline show Barb Anderson says she was responsible to look at all the abuse case files. Presumably these were all the reported cases over time.

  If my case was reported (and I don't know whether the cong servant at the time did report to headquarters) but if it was reported then the cases on file could go back 40 years. Of my 4 JW abusers that year, 1 is dead, 2 are no longer JWs, and one is still active.

  If the files do indeed contain all abusers every reported then the 23,720 might be very reasonable
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  abbagail

  Just for the record, that entire 'article' from that link was written by Bill Bowen quite awhile ago, and is at the silentlambs website: http://www.silentlambs.org/answers/23720.cfm
  
  Whoever created that link and sent the info around via email, i do not know. But i'm sure silentlambs wouldn't mind the extra exposure of the information, but it would've been nice if whoever made that link would have put the silentlambs link on the page too. Unless they are trying to target current JWs (?) with the info, who may be turned off if they saw the names Bill Bowen or Silentlambs. But Bowen IS the author of the article, and it was 'insiders' who contacted him with the 23,000+ figure. FWIW.
  
  GRITS
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  avengers
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  RevMalk

  Just for the record, that entire 'article' from that link was written by Bill Bowen quite awhile ago, and is at the silentlambs website: http://www.silentlambs.org/answers/23720.cfm
  
  Whoever created that link and sent the info around via email, i do not know. But i'm sure silentlambs wouldn't mind the extra exposure of the information, but it would've been nice if whoever made that link would have put the silentlambs link on the page too. Unless they are trying to target current JWs (?) with the info, who may be turned off if they saw the names Bill Bowen or Silentlambs. But Bowen IS the author of the article, and it was 'insiders' who contacted him with the 23,000+ figure. FWIW.
  
  GRITS

  I created that page and did in fact leave out the name of Bowen and silentlambs because of the very reason you stated. I'm sure as well they don't mind the extre 'free' exposure, and I also feel the 'credit' goes to the survivors not the author Rev PS - I didn't send the link via email, though. Probably a friend thought they m,ight want to see the page.
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  avishai

  but if there were 27,000 active Jehovah's Witnesses who were pedophiles, that would bespeak an illness of epidemic proportions

  not out of 6 million or so, that's reasonable. Also, keep in mind that your average pedophile molests at LEAST 50 kids, I've heard #'s triple that, in his/her lifetime.
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  Undaunted Danny

  It has been suggested that the Jehovah's Witnesses may have 4 X's the pedophiles per capita as the Catholic clergy?

  This could be due to the JW elders enforced,code of silence?

  This posting is 'AOP' sanctioned.That means that i used WT$ approved mealy mouthing weasel words,and framed the accusation in the form of a question.