{"id":975,"date":"2022-07-26T17:55:48","date_gmt":"2022-07-26T17:55:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/jwchildabuse.org\/xqllht\/?p=975"},"modified":"2022-07-27T22:18:06","modified_gmt":"2022-07-27T22:18:06","slug":"california-appellate-court-slams-watchtower-jehovahs-witnesses-fined-ordered-to-produce-child-abuse-docs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/jwchildabuse.org\/xqllht\/news\/california-appellate-court-slams-watchtower-jehovahs-witnesses-fined-ordered-to-produce-child-abuse-docs\/","title":{"rendered":"California Appellate Court Slams Watchtower, Jehovah\u2019s Witnesses Fined, Ordered To Produce Child Abuse Docs"},"content":{"rendered":"

Published November 14th, 2017<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cWatchtower has abused the discovery process. It has zealously advocated its position and lost multiple times. Yet, it cavalierly refuses to acknowledge the consequences of these losses and the validity of the court\u2019s orders requiring it to produce documents\u2026And, in a further act of defiance, Watchtower informed the court that it would not comply with the March 25, 2016 order\u00a0requiring it to produce documents\u2026\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

So stated the California Fourth Court of Appeal in a decision where the Watchtower organization has been held responsible for refusal to hand over its database of child abuse files, specifically those it has been collecting since March of 2001. The court penalized Watchtower in the amount of $4,000 per day, a fine which has been accruing for over a year, and which may surpass two million dollars.<\/p>\n

This is in addition to significant legal fees paid by Watchtower to\u00a0Morris Polich & Purdy<\/a><\/span>, the California firm retained for their defense.\u00a0The November 9th ruling<\/a><\/span>\u00a0further stipulates that Watchtower must pay the legal costs incurred as a result of their appeal, a hefty price to pay for their adamant refusal to turn over child abuse files.<\/p>\n

The Case<\/h2>\n

Abuse victim Osbaldo Padron filed suit against the Watchtower Organization following the discovery that Congregation elders in the Playa Pacifica Spanish Congregation, along with Watchtower officials in New York, had known for more than a decade that Gonzalo Campos had molested multiple boys. Neither the police nor child protective services were contacted by church elders, or by Watchtower. Instead, Campos was elevated from congregant, to Ministerial Servant, and finally to Elder by June of 1993.<\/p>\n

Not long after Campos\u2019 appointment, Padron was molested at just 7-8 years of age.<\/p>\n

\"Abuser<\/a>
Abuser Gonzalo Campos<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

In 2011, Campos admitted on camera to allegations of pedophilia, but has since fled to Mexico and is\u00a0presumed to be an active Jehovah\u2019s Witness. The congregation elders who protected Campos, along with the Watchtower Bible and Tract Society are being held responsible for the willful neglect which led to the sexual abuse of multiple victims.<\/p>\n

While some victims have already settled with Watchtower in private, undisclosed agreements, two victims of Campos opted to file civil lawsuits in an attempt to hold the Jehovah\u2019s Witness organization accountable both financially and legally. The two victims are Jose Lopez and Osbaldo Padron.<\/p>\n

Jose Lopez filed a civil suit in February of 2013, in which attorney Irwin Zalkin and his team obtained subpoenas for documents related to Watchtower\u2019s knowledge of the prevalence of childhood sexual abuse within its organization. Additionally, Zalkin obtained an order to depose Governing Body Member Gerrit Losch as the Person Most Qualified (PMQ) to testify for Watchtower.<\/p>\n

Watchtower refused to cooperate, failing to produce the requested documents in full, and Losch denied that he had any legal connection to Watchtower. In 2001, Watchtower removed Governing Body members from their New York and Pennsylvania corporations to insulate them from legal responsibility. The Superior Court of the State of California did not find this tactic amusing, and issued a default judgment for Lopez, awarding him 13.5 million dollars.<\/p>\n

Watchtower\u2019s Costly Mistake<\/h2>\n

Watchtower appealed the Lopez verdict and argued that the terminating judgment was unfair, that it did not give them a chance to defend their position. The court agreed that lesser sanctions should have been tried first in an attempt to pry loose those documents. Watchtower eventually released four years\u2019 worth of heavily redacted files, from March 1997 to March 2001.<\/p>\n

Why only four years?<\/p>\n

Watchtower made a costly and damaging decision when it released\u00a0a letter to all congregations dated March 14, 1997<\/a>,<\/span> in which congregation elders were advised to submit reports on all \u201cformer\u201d\u00a0 or \u201cknown\u201d child molesters who had relocated from a different congregation.<\/p>\n

Congregations were instructed to allow all elders access to information regarding child molesters, while also forwarding details to Watchtower Headquarters inside a \u201cspecial blue envelope.\u201d Elders were instructed not to discuss this information with any congregation member.<\/p>\n

This official edict from Watchtower provides the legal starting point for the document discovery process, despite the fact that Jehovah\u2019s Witnesses had been collecting child abuse and other sensitive documents at headquarters for decades.<\/p>\n

Faced with the choice of compliance or writing a check for 13.2 million dollars, Watchtower released those documents, but redacted them excessively, and stopped with March 2001. This was the year that the Christian Congregation of Jehovah\u2019s Witnesses (CCJW) was formed. Watchtower\u2019s legal team argues that once CCJW was formed, they no longer had access to or control over child abuse documents.<\/p>\n

<\/h1>\n

Osbaldo Padron<\/h2>\n

Meanwhile, victim Osbaldo Padron filed suit against Watchtower in September of 2013. Among the allegations were\u00a0negligence; negligent supervision\/failure\u00a0to warn; negligent hiring\/retention; negligent failure to warn, train, or educate; sexual\u00a0battery; and sexual harassment.<\/p>\n

Watchtower officials and multiple congregation elders had significant knowledge that Gonzalo Campos was a sexual predator, yet did nothing to protect Osbaldo Padron, the congregation, or the local community.<\/p>\n

As with Lopez, Padron demanded that Watchtower release all of it\u2019s child abuse documentation from March 1997 forward. Watchtower refused to comply, arguing 1st amendment protection, clergy-penitent privilege, and attorney-client privilege as a basis for non-compliance.<\/p>\n

Senior Watchtower Service Department official Richard Ashe declared that Padron\u2019s request for these documents was unreasonable and that it would take a full-time worker at headquarters up to 28 years to search through the files of over 14,400 congregations, and retrieve the abuse cases demanded by the plaintiff. The court rejected Watchtower\u2019s arguments, including the attempt to disclose only documents from the state of California.<\/p>\n

As mentioned earlier, Watchtower released redacted documents from the period of March 1997 to March 2001. Watchtower continued to maintain that it had no obligation to produce documents after March 2001, claiming that Watchtower and CCJW are separate entities.<\/p>\n

The court-appointed discovery referee disagreed, describing Watchtower and CCJW as \u201calter egos.\u201d The court agreed with the referee and issued an order dated March 25th, 2016, demanding a complete document release by Watchtower.<\/p>\n

Watchtower refused.<\/p>\n

The legal battle continued, with the court ultimately deciding that sanctions against Watchtower were both justified and necessary. The court stated:<\/p>\n

\u201c<\/strong>In this case, there is a clear failure to comply with a discovery order on the part of Watchtower. First, Watchtower failed to properly comply with the court\u2019s March 13, 2015 [order] and produced documents with excessive redactions. After the court adopted the Discovery Referee\u2019s Recommendation as an order, Watchtower has unequivocally stated it will not comply. By the time of the hearing on the motion for sanctions, it will have been over a year since the initial order and almost three months since the Recommendation was adopted. In the period since the Recommendation was adopted, Watchtower has shown no effort or willingness to comply with the discovery order.\u201cBased upon the history in this case and Watchtower\u2019s statements at the April 8, 2016 [hearing], the court finds that Watchtower\u2019s failure to comply is willful. Watchtower argues that its failure is not willful because it has no control over CCJW documents. However, Watchtower clearly has control over the documents it has already produced and could revise the redactions with regard to those documents. This is obviously and clearly within the scope of Watchtower\u2019s powers which it chooses not to exercise. Continuing to repeat its prior unsuccessful arguments in opposition to the discovery order further illustrates Watchtower\u2019s obstinacy in compliance. Further, based upon the unambiguous statements made by Watchtower\u2019s counsel, there is no reasonable dispute that Watchtower is simply refusing even to attempt to comply with the court\u2019s order.\u201d<\/strong><\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

With this declaration, the court decided to punish Watchtower in the following manner:<\/p>\n

The court therefore sanctioned Watchtower $2,000 per day for every day Watchtower did\u00a0not produce responsive documents and $2,000 per day for every day Watchtower did not\u00a0search for responsive documents.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

This fine was deemed fair and just in consideration of the court\u2019s awareness of more than 1.3 billion dollars worth of real estate owned by the Watchtower organization.<\/p>\n

<\/h1>\n

Estoppel Traps Watchtower<\/h2>\n

Not surprisingly, Watchtower strongly objected to being fined $4,000 per day for failure to produce documents related to child abuse. Unfortunately this objection violated the legal principle known as estoppel. According to the court:<\/p>\n

\u201cJudicial estoppel precludes a party from gaining an advantage by taking one\u00a0position, and then seeking a second advantage by taking an incompatible position.The doctrine\u2019s dual goals are to maintain the integrity of the judicial system\u00a0and to protect parties from opponents\u2019 unfair strategies.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The court explained further how Watchtower violated this legal principle:<\/p>\n

\u201cHere, we find all the elements of judicial estoppel present. Watchtower has taken\u00a0two positions. In Lopez, supra, 266 Cal.App.4th 566, it argued monetary sanctions,\u00a0untethered to the plaintiff\u2019s reasonable costs, were appropriate. In the instant matter,\u00a0Watchtower now claims the superior court was not authorized to issue such sanctions.\u00a0Watchtower has taken these contrary positions in two separate cases before this court.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The reality of the situation is that Watchtower\u2019s attorneys were boxed in due to the $13.2 million dollar judgment in the Lopez case, and felt they had no other recourse but to claim that the court should have fined them a lesser penalty. But when they were assessed this lesser penalty in the Padron case, they strongly objected. The patience of California\u2019s justice system had run thin, as the court finally declared:<\/p>\n

\n

\u201cHere, it is beyond debate that Watchtower has abused the litigation process and\u00a0has shown little respect for the superior court\u2019s authority.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Reaffirming that the financial penalties imposed by the Superior Court of California were justifiable, the court declared:<\/p>\n

\u201cNonetheless, Watchtower refuses to comply with the court order and maintains the court was just wrong. In this sense, it refuses to acknowledge the authority of the court and repudiates the procedures and rules all litigants are supposed to follow in superior court. In these extreme circumstances, we conclude the superior court was authorized to issue the monetary sanctions\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

It is clear that the California appellate court was well aware of Watchtower\u2019s intentional obfuscation when it blurred the lines between the Watchtower Organization and the Christian Congregation of Jehovah\u2019s Witnesses (CCJW). The attempt to claim that Watchtower had no access or control of documents possessed by CCJW was an attempt to mislead the court.<\/p>\n

\n

\u201cThe representations of Watchtower\u2019s counsel as well as the\u00a0declarations of Watchtower agents clearly indicate that Watchtower has access to\u00a0responsive documents from 1997 to present. We thus conclude substantial evidence\u00a0supports the discovery referee\u2019s finding, adopted by the court, that Watchtower was in\u00a0\u201ccustody and control\u201d of responsive documents beyond the March 2001 creation of\u00a0CCJW.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Watchtower Versus Watchtower<\/h2>\n

Further substantiating the legal gamesmanship taking place in an attempt to circumvent justice and mislead the court, Watchtower sent a letter to its alter ego, CCJW,\u00a0 in a measure feigning compliance with the document production order of March 25th 2016.<\/p>\n

The first letter, dated July 2nd 2016 was sent from Watchtower\u2019s California law firm, Morris, Polich & Purdy, to Anthony P. La Rocco, attorney for CCJW:<\/p>\n

\"July<\/a>
July 2, 2016 Letter from Watchtower Attorneys to CCJW<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

This letter was followed by a reply from the firm representing CCJW, in which Watchtower\u2019s California counsel was informed that CCJW was not a party to the Padron Case and had no obligation or duty to respond to the document production order:<\/p>\n

\"July<\/a>
July 11th 2016 Letter from CCJW to Watchtower<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Once again, the court was not tricked by these tactics, and called attention to Watchtower\u2019s inconsistent stance:<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u201cWe find it curious that the existence of CCJW and the March 2001 cut off only\u00a0became an issue after Watchtower produced documents and Padron complained that the\u00a0production was not sufficient. It appears Watchtower argued that it had access to the\u00a0documents after March 2001 when it was to its benefit to support its burden argument,\u00a0but only after losing that argument, it claimed to not have access to documents after a\u00a0certain point of time to justify its limited production. Such gamesmanship has no place in civil discovery. \u201c<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

In other words \u2013 Watchtower originally claimed that it was excessively burdensome to search ALL their documents from 1997 to the present,\u00a0revealing that they did indeed have possession of these documents.<\/strong><\/em>\u00a0They then attempted an alternate strategy by declaring that they did NOT have access to these documents, and that CCJW could not legally produce them.<\/p>\n

Judgment Day<\/h2>\n

As a result of the proceedings outlined above, the Fourth Appellate District Court of Appeal has affirmed the lower court\u2019s ruling that the Watchtower Bible and Tract Society of New York, Inc. is responsible for the payment of the $4,000 per day fine assessed back in 2016, along with all costs associated with this appeal.<\/p>\n

The court concluded its judgment by stating:<\/p>\n

\n

\u201cOn the\u00a0record before us, we are satisfied that the superior court\u2019s order was not arbitrary,\u00a0capricious, or whimsical. To the contrary, the superior court has shown great patience\u00a0and flexibility in dealing with a\u00a0recalcitrant litigant<\/strong>\u00a0who refuses to follow valid orders\u00a0and merely reiterates losing arguments. We therefore affirm.\u201d [bold ours]<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<\/blockquote>\n

The judgment was entered November 9th 2017. Watchtower has 40 days to file a petition for review with the California Supreme Court. Jose Lopez and Osbaldo Padron continue their civil cases against Watchtower in the Superior Court of California, County of San Diego.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Read the complete appellate court judgment<\/strong><\/em>\u00a0\u00a0here<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\n

 <\/p>\n