![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() When we contacted the Christian Congregation of the Jehovah’s Witnesses for comment for Call Bethel, they highlighted their current child protection policies, which instruct leaders to “make a report to the police wherever it appears that a child is in danger of abuse”. He recalled how, over time, the numbers of child sexual abuse cases “grew and grew”. The source had spent decades as a “circuit overseer” – the Jehovah’s Witness equivalent of an area manager – and has visited hundreds of congregations up and down the country. Then they were to put those details in a “special blue envelope” and send them to the organisation headquarters, known as Bethel. ![]() They were to log details such as “the age of his victim(s)”, whether it was “a one-time occurrence or a practice” and whether the accused perpetrator has “disfellowshipped, reproved, counselled or otherwise dealt with”. But after months of painstaking investigation we found proof.Ī very senior former Jehovah’s Witness handed us a copy of a crucial letter addressed to “bodies of elders” – or congregation leaders – in Britain, and instructed them to produce records of child abuse allegations. In 2015, the Australian Royal Commission – a wide-ranging inquiry into child sexual abuse – obtained records of child sexual allegations against more than 1,000 different people, including 400 who were accused of abusing more than one child.Īt first, we didn’t know if Australia might be an anomaly, and wondered if the same system of record keeping might be in place in Britain. ![]()
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