Allegations of Abuse in Institutions |
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A
woman who fled the Exclusive Brethren church says she is aware of multiple
cases of child sex abuse which were covered up by the religious sect. Phillipa,
who prefers not to give her family name, says the acts took place over
several decades and the victims were mainly teenage boys. She
is now prepared to co-operate with any police investigation. Philippa
was encouraged to live her life by The Bible for 40 years, but the former
Exclusive Brethren member says when it came to morality, the sect was anything
but an open book. She
says sexual abuse by teenagers with other teenage males and children was
dealt with by the church underground. "If
it was covered up back then, it's probably still covered up today," she
says. "In
the particular place where I lived there was a huge amount of sodomy amongst
the teenage boys etcetera. And that's one of the reasons why I've shifted my
family away from that area where we used to live," she says. Philippa
left the Exclusive Brethren with her seven children six years ago. She says
the abuse was occurring up until nine years ago. She
did not want to show her face but she does want to speak out, something she
says the victims of abuse struggle to do. "You
definitely wouldn't want to tell anybody, 'cause then everybody would know
about you and you would be looked upon as the bad person because you spoke
out." And
she says she is not talking about isolated incidents. "I
would say there's multiple offenders. If I asked them now they would try and
deny it because in there is a huge fear and guilt thing and perhaps a lot of
people in there who have got this problem and involved in this sort of thing,
would not go outside of the church for help. A lot of these people need
help." She
says she knows names of offenders but "hadn't really thought" about
going to the police. "It's
hard for me to. I know this doesn't sound good but those things, they were
just sort of part of life and things that happened." Philippa
says the victims would now be in their twenties, thirties and forties and all
remain in the church. Her
claims have an echo across the Tasman. Joy
Nason a former Exclusive Brethren member told the ABC she has heard people
confess to molesting children. She
said those acts were "definitely not" reported to the police. "No
they were forgiven. If the person was sorry, if the person showed enough
contrition, the Brethren forgave them." No
New Zealand Exclusive Brethren members contacted by One News were prepared to
comment on Philippa's claims. But
she has given One News the names of seven men she says were involved in acts
of sexual abuse and is now prepared to co-operate with any police
investigation.
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