The inquiry expressed ‘concern about the faith’s overall approach to the safety of children and young people in its care’.

The stories below include accounts of sexual abuse.

It was the early 1980s and Ms SC, then 15, was a member of the New Zealand Jehovah’s Witness community. Elders in the church – a fundamentalist Christian group, which adopts a literal interpretation of its bible and believes Armageddon is imminent – were concerned about her behaviour. She was required to attend an Elder’s home for extra religious study, led by his wife.

“I would often be at their place after school or to go on outings. In addition to one-on-one bible studies with the Elder’s wife, I would join their family regularly for their family bible study,” she recalled.

When the tuition was over, the Elder “would drive me home”, said Ms SC. Except that, “instead of going home, he took me to another area nearby where there were no houses or anything at that time. This was when the abuse took place. It happened many times over a period of four to five months. At first he touched my genitals, then he digitally penetrated me, then he had full sexual intercourse with me.”

Ms SC’s story appears as part of a 64-page case study focused on Jehovah’s Witnesses in New Zealand, part of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in State Care, tabled yesterday in parliament. The church unsuccessfully applied to the Court of Appeal at the 11th hour to halt publication of the case study pending an application to the Supreme Court to appeal an earlier ruling. The application was denied. 

Statements to the Royal Commission included descriptions of an arcane investigation process followed by the church. “Jasmine Grew told the inquiry that she had disclosed abuse [by a family member] to her mother in 1989, when she was 12 years old. Her mother told the Elders of her congregation ‘as she was expected’ to do. Soon after at a faith meeting, an Elder came up to Jasmine and said ‘we’d like to speak to you in the back room’.”

Grew said: “I went back into the back room and the elders [both male] were there. I had no support, no friend, no mother, nothing. My mother did not know, at the time, what was happening.”

She continued: “The elders interrogated me. They were asking the worst questions you can imagine, for someone who was just 12 years old. They asked me, ‘Was it hard,’ referring to my abuser physically. They wanted to know everything. Their questions were inappropriate. At that age it was a terrifying experience for me. It seemed as abusive as the sexual abuse itself … I was honest, and I told them everything because I had to be honest. I was fearful of the consequences of Armageddon. The two words that come to me still now are humiliation and embarrassment … [The Elders] were very intimidating. They made no attempt to support or comfort me in this process.”

Another who gave testimony was Debbie Oakley, who previously told her story as part of a Spinoff investigation in 2018. She told the inquiry how, aged 16, she and her sister had met with three church Elders to report abuse by her stepfather. Her abuser had been “disfellowshipped” after admitting to abusing a seven-year-old girl before Debbie but, the inquiry found, “had been allowed back into the faith and appointed as a ministerial servant”.

The meeting took place in a car, with a pair of Elders in the front seats and Debbie, her sister and the third Elder in the back. According to the inquiry, “the Elders did not report the abuse to secular authorities or do anything else to protect Debbie from further abuse by her stepfather.”

The inquiry found there was “credible evidence that the practice of questioning children or young people, particularly those who were victims of sexual abuse, during such investigations and judicial committee processes was inappropriate and emotionally or psychologically abusive. The evidence showed the severe impact that such practices had on the individuals concerned.”

It concluded there was credible evidence that “sexual abuse occurred in the care of the Jehovah’s Witnesses faith” and that the church “took inadequate steps to prevent and respond to abuse in care”. It found that “the practice of Elders questioning children or young people who were victims of sexual abuse during investigations and judicial committee processes was inappropriate and emotionally or psychologically abusive”.

The risks were exacerbated owing to “high barriers to the disclosure of abuse, making it more difficult for individuals to disclose any abuse either to others within the faith or to secular authorities. These barriers included the inferior position of women within the faith, rigid disclosure processes, the fear of being shunned and the relative disconnection from non-Jehovah’s Witnesses, all of which likely prevented or delayed victims from disclosing abuse.” There was also a “lack of vetting and training of Elders in child protection and abuse prevention”.

Survivors told the Royal Commission that they were afraid to report abuse to the church because of the consequences of being excommunicated or “disfellowshipped”. Elise Neame put it this way: ““I wanted to avoid being disfellowshipped because I knew the serious repercussions, which would include losing my family. This was a fear that stayed with me for a long time … [The Jehovah’s Witnesses] torture members with fear of the end of the world and the fear of what will happen if you break their rules – the fear of being disfellowshipped and losing family and friends.”

After being confronted when she was 17 for having a boyfriend and “drinking and partying a little”, Elise was disfellowshipped. 

“I would be at the supermarket and see my auntie or a long-time childhood friend and they would see me, only to completely ignore me or walk the other way,” she said. “I … saw my mother doing street preaching and she looked the other way. Family would have gatherings, wedding events, and celebrations, and completely shun me. I would find out about new additions to the family through others … I went four years without seeing or speaking to my mother or any of my [Jehovah’s Witness] family. I spent four years in a deep depression; I was suicidal, and completely lost. I have seen many therapists and counsellors, and no one can ever understand the terrible damage that this religion’s shunning of people causes.”

She said: “I now have nothing to lose. There is nothing more that the Jehovah’s Witnesses can take away from me. This religion has destroyed my life… I often daydream of what it is like to be part of a normal family, what it is like to have a support system.”

Documents shared with the inquiry painted a picture of their own. For example: “In one matter where an Elder had sexual intercourse with a 15-year-old girl, the Jehovah’s Witnesses’ summary notes read ‘the Elders all felt great shock at the seriousness of the sin, the repercussions to the congregation should the girl become pregnant and the sin thus become known’.”

The report also noted: “The inquiry has not seen any evidence of the Jehovah’s Witnesses referring sexual abuse allegations to police during the inquiry period in Aotearoa New Zealand. This is consistent with inquiry findings in Australia and the United Kingdom.”

The Jehovah’s Witness church has been fighting for years to avoid the scrutiny of the inquiry, arguing that it did not have children or young people under its “care”, and therefore should be excluded. The remit of the inquiry was extended shortly after its commissioning to cover faith-based institutions. Jehovah’s Witness was the only such institution to launch a legal challenge, in keeping with the approach it has adopted to similar inquiries in Australia and the UK.

The church made a similar objection to the categorisation of the account by Ms SC as taking place in its care. Its position, according to the case study, “is that it has never assumed responsibility for the care of children in their homes nor condoned or had any policy to support an Elder being alone in a child’s home … the faith had not assumed responsibility for Ms SC when the abuse occurred.”

For its part, the Royal Commission, “finds that Ms SC was in the care of the faith at the time of the abuse. The faith conferred power and authority on the Elder. He assumed responsibility for Ms SC through an informal pastoral care relationship, related to the faith’s work, namely Bible studies and caring for ‘fatherless children’ within the congregation. The faith’s assumption of responsibility for Ms SC flowed from it conferring authority and trusted status on the Elder, and the actions of the Elder in taking Ms SC into his care, unsupervised.”

In its report, the inquiry further observed, “the faith’s approach to this inquiry was premised on the basis that no children or young people were ever in its care. The ongoing failure of the faith to recognise that children and young people were in its care and adapt its approach to child safety gives the inquiry significant concern about the faith’s overall approach to the safety of children and young people in its care.”

The church is currently seeking leave to appeal to the Supreme Court. Pending that decision it applied to the Court of Appeal on Friday night to halt today’s publication of the case study as part of the overall report. 

Justice Cooke on Tuesday dismissed the application, saying the prospects of success in the Supreme Court were low and noting the report’s publication was “a matter of considerable public interest”. It was relevant, he added, “that the appellant has waited until the very last moment to make this application.”

In a statement following the court ruling, a spokesperson for the Jehovah’s Witnesses said: “We have serious concerns about the accuracy of the report regarding Jehovah’s Witnesses and have no choice but to resort to court to address these issues. Child protection is of utmost concern to Jehovah’s Witnesses and we believe the people of New Zealand, its decision-makers and most importantly survivors, deserve to be presented with accurate information.”

The Royal Commission has recommended that the Jehovah’s Witnesses governing body should issue a “public apology and acknowledgement for the abuse and neglect in the care of Jehovah’s Witnesses in New Zealand”. Other religious organisations enjoined to publicly apologise are the Catholic church, the Anglican church, the Methodist Church, the Presbyterian Church, the Salvation Army and Gloriavale Christian Community.

You can read the commission’s report in full here and the Jehovah’s Witness case study here.