Jehovah's Witnesses and Child Sex Abuse - Reporting To Civil Authorities

Reporting To Civil Authorities

A press release issued in 2003 by Jehovah's Witnesses' Office of Public Information stated: "The elders may be required by law to report even uncorroborated or unsubstantiated allegations to the authorities. If so, we expect the elders to comply." The Watchtower magazine has outlined the following policy: "Depending on the law of the land where he lives, the molester may well have to serve a prison term or face other sanctions from the State. The congregation will not protect him from this." A 2002 memo to all congregations stated: "Our position is that secular authorities deal with crime while elders deal with sin." Even where there is no mandatory reporting requirement, victims or others having knowledge of an incident of sexual abuse must not be discouraged from reporting it.

The New York Times commented:

The shape of the scandal is far different than in the Catholic church, where most of the people accused of abuse are priests and a vast majority of the victims were boys and young men. In the Jehovah's Witnesses, where congregations are often collections of extended families and church elders are chosen from among the laypeople, some of those accused are elders, but most are congregation members. The victims who have stepped forward are mostly girls and young women, and many accusations involve incest.

Congregation elders are required to first contact the organization's legal department in cases of alleged abuse to establish whether there is a legal duty to report the sex crime to the civil authorities or not. In Canada, elders were advised:

There is a duty to report when one has reasonable and probable grounds to believe that there is abuse or a substantial risk of abuse and parents have failed to protect the child. The report shall be made forthwith to the local child welfare authorities. Elders must be aware, however, that once they have knowledge, they have an obligation. They cannot just hope that someone else will report. They must follow through quickly, and be sure that it is done."

The elders' manual, Pay Attention to Yourselves and to All the Flock, states: "Though it is not the responsibility of the Christian congregation to enforce Caesar's laws, the very nature of some crimes demands that they be reported to secular authorities." A 1995 memo to elders stated: "Many states make it mandatory that elders report an accusation to the proper authorities but other states do not. In those states where such is required, oftentimes the parent, the guardian, or the accused person himself can do the reporting." This was publicized by 1997.

In 2000, elders in Great Britain were instructed: "The elder approached must encourage the complainant to consider his or her responsibility to report the matter to the authorities without delay and should also explain that he himself might have a duty to report the matter to the proper authorities," and that "all in the Christian congregation will want to consider their personal and moral responsibility to alert the appropriate authorities in cases where a serious criminal offense of this type has been committed, or there exists a risk that one may be committed." In 2008, the Watch Tower Society of Britain, in discussions with the UK Charities Commission, undertook to produce a Child Protection Policy and update its procedures to bring them into line with other religious and secular bodies.