PURPOSE AND GOALS

It has been estimated that there are more than 1000 court cases filed every year in the United States which involve child custody disputes in divorce cases involving Jehovah's Witness Parent(s). In 1990, the chairman of the American Bar Association's Child Custody Committee estimated that at that time roughly 50% of all child custody cases being reviewed by state appellate courts in the United States involved a parent who was a Jehovah's Witness.

Custody cases involving children of Jehovah's Witnesses who need a life-saving blood transfusion may be even more frequent. Probably the only entity that has kept track of the numbers over the decades is the WatchTower Society Legal Department, and they certainly will never tell. One researcher has estimated that the annual rate of JW Minors who need a blood transfusion, or a working alternative, is one case for every one thousand JWs. If close, that would mean that currently, there are 1000+ cases annually here in the United States. Try to imagine the burden that this places on the American judicial and health care systems every single year.

A spokesperson for Harris County Children's Protective Services, of Houston, Texas, stated that in 1986 HCCPS had requested and received custody of approximately 10 to 12 children of Jehovah's Witnesses, who needed life-saving blood transfusions. The more shocking point made by the HCCPS spokesperson was that there had been many more cases in 1986 of children of Jehovah's Witnesses in Harris County hospitals, who needed life-saving blood transfusions, in which the hospitals themselves directly requested court intervention without HCCPS involvement. HCCPS was called upon only under certain extreme circumstances. Interestingly, ten years later, in 1997, a spokesperson for the Harris County District Attorney stated that their office handled 1 to 2 cases every month, in which JW Parents refused to consent to blood transfusions needed by their minor children.

In a 1989 interview, the spokesperson for Loma Linda University Children's Hospital, in California, told a reporter that that hospital alone administered 4 to 5 court-ordered blood transfusions to Jehovah's Witness Minors every year. In a 2007 interview, the spokesperson for Vanderbilt University Medical Center, in Nashville, Tennessee, told a reporter that that hospital alone had to go to court 2 to 3 times every year to get court authorization for a blood transfusion for a Jehovah's Witness Minor. Do the math!

The purpose of this website is to bring together in one website summaries of as many custody and other miscellaneous legal disputes involving children of Jehovah's Witnesses as can be located in published news reports and court decisions. Currently, there are over 700 Cases summarized. Approximately 380 Cases are summarized in the BLOOD TRANSFUSIONS section; approximately 125 more lengthy Cases are summarized in the DIVORCES section; and approximately 200 Cases are summarized in other sections. An additional 140 "SECRET" Historical Cases are linked from the JW INFO page.

The information found in these case summaries will hopefully be of benefit to parents, grandparents, and maybe even occasionally attorneys involved in court cases involving members of the Jehovah's Witnesses religion.

Relatives, friends, doctors, nurses, teachers, counselors, ministers, and others involved in the lives of Jehovah's Witnesses families may also find the information found in these court cases to be beneficial.

Additionally, since court case decisions often provide otherwise unseen glimpses into the private lives of the involved parties, researchers and others interested in studying the culture, practices, beliefs, and other aspects of the Jehovah's Witnesses religion may also find the information found in these case summaries to be beneficial.

CHILD CUSTODY, JEHOVAH'S WITNESSES, AND THE LAW

The United States Supreme Court has yet to enter the fray of custody and religious upbringing of children. Thus far, such decisions have been left to the individual states. This has resulted in a hodgepodge of rules and interpretations that vary from state to state. This is extremely interesting given the amount of litigation, but more significantly, given the fact that such state decisions often require an extremely delicate balancing of the constitutional right of each parent and of each child to freedom of religious expression, parenting, deciding medical care, etc.

Parents who are members of the Jehovah's Witnesses community, especially those with spouses who are not Jehovah's Witnesses, are generally aware of their state's laws regarding their faith and the rearing of their children as Jehovah's Witnesses. The WatchTower Society's highly regarded Legal Department is anxious to assist without charge a member and their local attorney in local legal proceedings. In fact, Jehovah's Witnesses have been instructed that the WatchTower Society's Legal Department should be notified of all custody cases involving a Jehovah's Witness. If the Jehovah's Witness Parent loses at trial level, the WatchTower Society is even more anxious to assist with the appellate case. If the case reaches the state's Supreme Court, the non-JW Parent may very well see a WatchTower Lawyer sitting at the opposing table. The WatchTower Society's Legal Staff includes attorneys who work custody cases on a fulltime basis. This has allowed them to gain an enormous amount of experience and expertise in child custody cases.

Thus, it should go without saying that it is absolutely essential for a non-JW Parent to obtain experienced legal advice and representation as soon as possible after the issue rears its head.

BLOOD TRANSFUSIONS, JEHOVAH'S WITNESSES, AND THE LAW

"The day's news tells of a mother who sacrificed six ounces of her blood in a transfusion for her baby girl. Strange that the busy press should even consider this news. A mother who wouldn't consent to a blood transfusion for her child would be much greater news, and the world a sorry place indeed on the day that such news is found!" -- Columnist Allene Sumner, in 1926.

Since the WatchTower Society first stopped Jehovah's Witnesses from accepting blood transfusions in 1945, there has been a stream of state and federal court cases which have slowly but surely chipped away at the moral concept that to allow an adult or child to needlessly die inside a hospital setting is something unconscionable to our modern society. But, such has nearly been completely accomplished, thanks to the tireless efforts of the WatchTower Society's Legal Department.

The law in the United States regarding Jehovah's Witnesses and their refusal to accept blood transfusions is somewhat settled, although subject to exceptions. Most competent adults have the constitutional right to refuse to accept a blood transfusion, even if such refusal means they will die. Every year in the United States, an unknown number of adult Jehovah's Witnesses exercise their constitutional right to choose death over a life-saving blood transfusion. For every account of such death that is reported by the news media, there are an unknown number that go unreported due to confidentiality rules that restrain medical and hospital staff from releasing the fact that a death was due to the deceased's refusal to accept a blood transfusion.

Jehovah's Witness Parents will attempt to impose the same "death decision" on their minor children, but practically every hospital will attempt to obtain a court order which will permit them to administer medically necessary blood transfusions over the parent's objections -- assuming that the Jehovah's Witness Child is still alive by the time all the legalities are completed. Courts in the United States will nearly always appoint a temporary legal guardian under such circumstances to oversee and guarantee necessary medical care.

Scenarios involving pregnant Jehovah's Witnesses Mothers and their "fetuses", Jehovah's Witnesses Minors nearing the age of majority, and adult Jehovah's Witnesses who have parental obligations, are less settled, but are heading in the anticipated direction.

One of the benefits of studying the decades-long stream of court cases which have gradually given Jehovah's Witnesses the legal rights they now have regarding blood transfusions is learning about and understanding how during this decades-long process, the Jehovah's Witnesses have shared ideals and legal precedents with other groups which had common legal causes and interests.

For instance, the continued fight for legalization of abortion shares some of the same arguments as does the continuing blood transfusions issue as it relates to "unborn children", or as Jehovah's Witnesses prefer to label them when arguing such court cases -- "fetuses". Legal precedents have been shared by both groups. Opening the way to reject blood transfusions opens the way for other life-saving medical procedures to be refused. Right-to-die and assisted suicide advocates share some common arguments with the Jehovah's Witnesses. One can't help but wonder if and how often attorneys from some of these groups assisted the others with their own causes in order to help their own cause.

Another "light bulb" that finally came on during this legal study answered my decades-long curiosity as to why there were enclaves of Jehovah's Witnesses scattered around the United States who were adamant supporters of the midwife industry. Now, I know. One can only wonder how many hundreds, or possibly even thousands, of Jehovah's Witness newborns who needed a blood transfusion to survive died because their birth occurred outside a hospital setting. One can only wonder how many Jehovah's Witness families with known genetic problems, such as Rh factor incompatibility, repeatedly had baby, after baby, after baby, as those parents simply played a numbers game waiting for one to eventually survive. The evidence is inside.