Lawsuit Against SBC and Four Churches Alleges Negligence in Handling of Sexual Abuse Claims

A new lawsuit filed in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Tennessee will again test whether the Southern Baptist Convention, a convention of autonomous churches, can be held liable for sexual abuse that occurs in individual congregations. The suit, filed Dec. 31 but made public Feb. 6, combines the claims of six plaintiffs against the SBC and four of its affiliated churches, where sexual abuse is alleged to have occurred. Two other churches where abuse is alleged are not identified.

The suit includes a claim under the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act, known as RICO. It describes the SBC Executive Committee as “an association-in-fact” under federal law and as “an ongoing entity (enterprise) that functions as a continuing unit” that “was used as a tool to effectuate defendant(s) pattern of racketeering and use its influence over the local churches.”

Courts have previously dismissed similar claims against the SBC on the basis of the Baptist doctrine of local church autonomy, under which the convention says it has no control over any other Baptist body. Unlike Catholic or Methodist structures, the SBC has no bishops and no say in the affairs of individual churches. According to the report, that defense has faced closer scrutiny in the past three years because of assertions made in other cases. In one, the SBC Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission filed an amicus brief with the U.S. Supreme Court describing the SBC as working as a hierarchy; that brief was later amended. In a separate defamation suit brought against the SBC North American Mission Board by Will McRaney, the question of autonomy versus the stated doctrine has also been raised.

The plaintiffs allege that “the Baptist Church has done little or nothing to train employees and agents to look for abusers, screen abusers or protect church members and volunteers from the sexual predators who infiltrate its ranks.” The suit also states that pastors and other employees have been given “complete discretion and freedom to have personal, private and spiritual encounters” with individuals in their care. Protecting the vulnerable is the duty the plaintiffs say went unmet (Psalm 82:3). The suit further cites an independent investigation by Guidepost Solutions into the handling of sexual abuse claims at the SBC Executive Committee, quoting its finding that the convention “has gone to great lengths to protect ‘its own.'”

The defendants, as described in the suit, also allege that the SBC and its Executive Committee have resisted calls for reform and blocked reasonable efforts to educate churches and to prevent abusers from being passed from congregation to congregation. The suit states that defendants “have maliciously and systematically engaged in covering up and concealing instances of sexual abuse by the church members and employees as a strategy of denying the rights of sexual abuse survivors.” These are allegations in the plaintiffs’ filing and have not been proven in court.

The named defendants are the SBC Executive Committee, Fountain Valley Baptist Church in Fountain, Colo.; Faith Baptist Church in Danville, Ill.; Airline Baptist Church in Bossier City, La.; and First Baptist Church of Talladega, Ala.

One plaintiff alleges she was sexually abused over several years as a teenager by a pastor at Fountain Valley Baptist Church. Another alleges she was abused at age 13 by a deacon’s son at a church in Holy Hill, Fla., which is not identified in the suit. A third alleges she was abused at age 17 by a church staff member at Faith Baptist Church. A fourth alleges he was abused between ages 11 and 16 by a pastor at a Southern Baptist church in Aurora, Colo., which is also not identified in the suit. The final plaintiff named in the report alleges she was abused between ages 14 and 18 by an assistant pastor and a minister of music at Airline Baptist Church.

Source: Read the original report