Paedophiles repeatedly promoted to positions of authority in Jehovah’s Witness church royal commission told
- 1 HOUR AGO JULY 27, 2015 12:45PM
Counsel Assisting the Royal Commission, Angus Stewart SC has told the royal commission that church elders could now face criminal charges. Picture: Jeremy Piper/ Supplied Source: Supplied
THE Jehovah’s Witness church repeatedly promoted paedophiles to positions of authority and never reported any case of child abuse to the police, the child sex abuse royal commission has been told today.
Church elders could now face criminal charges for concealment of serious indictable offences and failure to disclose sexual offences against minors, counsel assisting the commission Angus Stewart SC said.
The church holds no insurance for child sex abuse and its corporation, Watchtower Australia, in 2008 considered forming a separate legal entity to minimise liability, Mr Stewart said.
One church Elder, who had sexually abused all four of his daughters, was “disfellowshipped” not for his crimes but for “unrelated loose conduct and lying”, the commission sitting in Sydney was told.
Justice Peter McClellan at the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse public hearing into allegations of child sexual abuse by Jehovah's Witness. Picture: Jeremy Piper/ Supplied Source: Supplied
One of his daughters will give evidence that she had to be interviewed by three church Elders together with her father and that instead of being supported, the Elders made her feel to blame.
Her father blamed her for seducing him.
In 2004, the father was convicted and jailed for unlawful and indecent assault and attempted rape.
Mr Stewart said the church’s own files reveal 1006 allegations of child sex abuse made against church members since 1950 but the Jehovah’s Witnesses dealt with them using “Biblical standards” and not the police.
They only believed victims if the alleged abuser confessed or there were two “credible” witnesses despite there rarely being witnesses to sex assaults beyond the victim and the perpetrator, Mr Stewart said.
“(There will be) evidence that the Jehovah’s Witness Church believes that loving and protective parents are the best deterrent to child abuse,” Mr Steward said.
He said the church believed the end of the world is near.
“Documents will be tendered which show that Jehovah’s Witnesses believe that the only way to finally end child abuse is to, as they put it, ‘embrace God’s Kingdom under Christ’ and to ‘love God with all your heart and your neighbour as yourself’ so as to be saved when the end comes,” Mr Stewart said.
Counsel Assisting Angus Stewart SC at the public hearing into allegations of child sexual abuse by Jehovah's Witness's.Source: Supplied
The church has 817 congregations across Australia with over 68,000 members, a growth of 29 per cent since 1990.
It deals with claims of sexual assault by having two Elders speak to the victim and the alleged offender but they can’t take any action unless it is proven to the Biblical standards.
If the Elders believe there is proof, they can form a judicial committee to determine “firstly if the individual is guilty of violating God’s laws and secondly, whether the individual is genuinely repentant,” Mr Stewart said.
Over the past 65 years, the requirement that there be two or more witnesses to child sex abuse has prevented at least 125 allegations of sex assault from proceeding to a judicial committee.
Since 1950, 401 alleged child sex abusers have been disfellowshipped, 78 of them on more than one occasion.
Another 190 were “reproved”, 11 of them more than once. This is a lesser form of discipline and allows the abuser to stay in the church.
In the same time, 28 alleged abusers were appointed to positions of authority and of 127 alleged abusers deleted as church leaders, 16 were reappointed.
The hearing is set down for two weeks.
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