Jehovah's Witnesses was disclosed in 2015 by the Australian Royal Commission on Child Sexual Assault Centers.
"Did you touch their genitals?" and,
"How many times have you touched their genitals?" Are they satisfied with you touching their genitals? "
These are the kind of questions each person will be facing, of course. The experience can be difficult for those dealing with these structures, like Renee Pickles.
I was appointed by the Judicial Service Commission and it was one of the worst situations in my life.
I believe it is the main cause of my many trauma. It was three men who had been on the interview team with me. I was not allowed to bring anyone to support me.
And I was interviewed, or rather, interrogated, at many meetings. And these questions became very close and private as to what I had done so they could just use the Holy Spirit to find out if I was still fit and clean enough to stay in church.
Can you give me an example of the kind of questions they asked you? Are you ... "Uh ..." Refreshed? "
"Are you in love?" Have you had sexual intercourse? "
"Are you ..." Um ... "Are you dizzy?"
"Did his exhumation affect your skin?"
You are only 21 years old, Renee was convicted of ‘unrepentant’ and given a ‘Notice of Disfellowshipping’.
He was thrown out of a world that he was not fully prepared for. I had no one to turn to and I lost my whole family and community. So, it was like I had fallen on a different planet, and it was a very lonely time. It was unbelievable.
Disfellowshipping is accompanied by a complete abandonment of society known as 'avoidance'. BRANDY SCHMIEDEL: It should be a loving discipline.
In fact, for me, it is violent to the point of completely avoiding being alone in your life, talking to anyone, everyone is completely removed from the life you once knew, especially when you were born and raised in an organization. And all of that is deleted.
That's ... That's not human. It's not love. American Brandy Schmiedel, who lives in Colorado, is a nephew of Governing Body member Stephen Lett. He ran away from his brother Steven Camp when he came out gay.
I knew his family meant the world to him. It was one of the most important things for Steven. Facing this decision was probably one of the biggest challenges he would face.
After five painful years, Brandy secretly resumed contact with her brother. But the rest of the family continued to avoid him. In 2020 he committed suicide, leaving these orders at his funeral: It was one of the most important things in his life was his family. With his friends.
And he lost both. Shortly after Steven's death, his uncle Stephen Lett provided this address regarding the impending Apocalypse.
There will be many more returnees who will need to leave their former way of life. I thought of it as an example as a homosexual.
Now, this former homosexual came back from the Resurrection and really thought and was taught and believed that God accepted him in that way of life.
But now you are about to learn about Jehovah's moral standards. It was extremely insensitive, especially since this was just a few months after my brother's death.
It gave me the courage to talk about this because this needs to end because it hurts so many people. I've had hundreds, if not thousands, of people, come to me and say they face exactly the same thing Steven went through.
Or know someone who has it. And most of them have they tried or known that someone has committed suicide for the same reasons.
The banned land of Jehovah's Witnesses was disclosed in 2015 by the Australian Royal Commission on Child Sexual Assault Centers. JAMES PENDER: It was an amazing process. We were opposed to what the community believed, being a very small group of lawyers.
There were three, three or four, working on the case.
James Pender was part of a team that received a large number of internal files that were edited by Jehovah's Witnesses for over 60 years.
Everything is written down. So, what are the allegations of survivors, what was said, and what is being done all recorded?
These records are then forwarded to the Australia branch office and saved to file.
Files documenting allegations and admitting the abuse of more than 1,800 children by more than 1,000 suspects are accused of doing so.
We looked at these 5,000 files and created a spreadsheet describing the alleged perpetrator, recording the number of victims, the age of the victims, their location, whether the perpetrator was a service elder or a servant at the time, positions of people who do not know all the relevant details.
So, it was a very forensic procedure and, I think when I look back, it hurts a lot.
The Royal Commission found no evidence that the Australia branch office had notified the authorities of any violations listed in its files. It was a measure of what was recorded, the wonder of what was recorded, the closeness of what was recorded, and the fact that none of it was reported. Um ... It was amazing.
KEVIN DEAN: Yes, having 1,800 victims, more than a thousand perpetrators, and not a single case will be reported to the authorities, to the police, it is shocking, I couldn't believe it.
"If anyone comes to you and does not bring this teaching, do not receive him into your homes or say a greeting to him," for he who welcomes you "is a sharer in his wicked works. "The rate of abuse surprised Kevin Dean, formerly one of Jehovah's Witnesses in the US. If you look at the numbers in Australia for Jehovah's Witnesses and the numbers in the United States, we have over one million Witnesses.
Yes, I did not know that the situation is worse in the United States than in Australia. When It submitted a 2018 report stating that the Royal Commission was inherently unjust and that the organization should not be held accountable for the abuse of Witness families.
IRWIN ZALKIN: The argument that Jehovah's Witnesses, unlike other religious organizations, do not care for children - therefore, they have no schools, no after-school programs, no catechism or those kinds of programs when caring for children - and, therefore, cannot hold them to the same standards and other religious institutions with care.
That's a lie. JAMES PENDER: The Commission's view was that because the laws and principles of Jehovah's Witnesses determine how all aspects are considered A member of Jehovah's Witnesses should live his life, that there really was no difference in family life.
As well as the state of the church center and the fact that the center of the institution actually included families.
The Royal Commission has criticized Jehovah's Witnesses for failing to report child sexual abuse to the police, and made three important recommendations - it should include women in its adjudication committees, omit the testimony of two witnesses in cases of abuse, and refrain from avoiding people traveling.
The Witnesses stated that they would not use such expressions because their practices are based on the Bible. The policies and practices themselves are based on the Bible text and are outdated and in no way appropriate for the sexual abuse of children and the response to child sexual abuse.
Elders who are Jehovah's Witnesses are bound by the rules set out in their most important book, Shepherd The Flock Of God. It states that "sexual abuse of children is a serious sin."
It was recommended that, in the case of the case, two elders be Jehovah's Witnesses.
"He should call the Legal Department immediately" and wait for instruction.
The letter does not provide guidelines for reporting anything to management. This is especially true of the legal department of the branch office of Jehovah's Witnesses.
There is nothing about the authorities at all. In a statement to the four corners of the earth, Jehovah's Witnesses stated that they would report allegations of abuse to the authorities.
When required by law or when a child is in danger regardless of whether there are two witnesses. The organization also reviewed its guidelines on child abuse around the world to ensure that victims and their parents "have the right to report" child abuse to authorities.
KHATHLEEN HALLISEY: I think language is important when -
"It is your right to report it to the police," but you are not told to do so. Of course, if a person is told by an elder that he is going to report to the police, the way the organization works, they will do so.
All you need is a sentence, "If you hear about child abuse, report it to the police," and I believe it is the best thing that ever happened.
To Jehovah's Witnesses and that organization. Just one sentence - "If you hear about child abuse, call the police." Until last year, Kevin Dean was an elder in the US.
After receiving a report on child abuse in 2019, he sent it to the law department. He was ordered to fill out a form that would be used to defend the organization in court.
And, so, as I complete this, I do not understand why I am doing this and what kind of cases, what kind of legal problem will we have?
"Why would I need a lawyer?"
And the more I read official verbiage in it, the more I realized that this is not child protection. They were concerned about protecting the organization.
What happened next surprised Kevin Dean. About a few weeks after these discussions with the legal department,
I get a call and my brother says, "Brother Dean,
"We want you to destroy all your notes, text and electronic."
And I think they were afraid that there would be some conflict between the elders' notes and their questions. And, therefore, since we had already completed the questionnaire, they did not want anything to contradict that.
He decided to leave Jehovah's Witnesses and to testify against them in the United States investigation. Do you think it was about protecting the organization?
Certainly. I think they were very concerned about protecting their property.
The Watchtower is concerned about money, and they do not want any kind of debt to be paid. Two years after the Royal Commission, elders investigating the sins of conspirators in Australia were advised to take notes of interviews.
If the so-called "insane talk" of a member: And any personal notes: Deliberately damaging documents related to a case involving child sexual abuse, that could be sensitive and sensitive evidence whether it is criminal prosecution or civil war, it can be illegal in many places. In many of our cases, those were sensitive documents.
It is kept in a secret form with little information, but, in fact, in many congregations, the elders wrote their notes in those files, and their notes were detailed, notes telling the real story.
The firm is notoriously at the moment ... U.S. Attorney Irwin Zalkin has seven counts on a train with the Governing Body on charges of child abuse within the church.
We called this press conference today to announce that we have filed another lawsuit against Jehovah's Witnesses. He wants to hold leaders accountable and make them witness publicly in America for the first time.
They will do all they can to avoid what they call 'dishonor' to Jehovah, and that includes keeping everything in a house.
Proponents of her case have been working to make the actual transcript of this statement available online so both child abuse and method, responds to the victims. Kathleen Hallisey brought the first successful community.
