Transcription
Hi, welcome to Risk Management Live. My name is Andy Whaley. With me today is Jerry Sparks, president of AG Financial Insurance Solutions and one of the nation's leading experts in church risk management. Great to have you here today.
Thank you. So we're going to be talking about a very interesting topic. It's a topic that a lot of pastors are talking about right now because it's the number one reason that churches end up in court. Do you mind telling us a little bit about this topic and what we're going to be talking about today?
The actually, the number one reason why churches end up in court is because of sexual misconduct with a minor. So there are certain steps that churches are going to want to take to help prevent that from happening. They should have a response plan for dealing with this situation, and we're going to give some other practical advice also.
Great. We talked a little bit before this, and I know that you mentioned that part of what we'll be talking about is actually practical advice for pastors on dealing with the press. Is that right?
That's correct. What are those things that they should say, not say, things like that? That is a very big topic. I was dealing with a church, oh, probably about a year ago, as visiting a pastor, and he was delayed in meeting with me, but then I found out the reason why, and I was able to work with them. The press had just released some kind of an announcement that someone in their church had some kind of a sexual misconduct issue with someone in the church, and they were literally across the street waiting to try to get an interview. I was able to direct that pastor to you, and you were able to help consult him on how to deal with the press. So it's very timely. I know that a lot of the leadership in the Assemblies of God looked to you to provide that consultation. So very excited that the pastors watching this, the leaders in the church are going to be able to glean from those insights. So if you could tell us a little bit about this sexual misconduct issue, why it's the number one issue for church litigation, and what pastors can do about it.
Well, number one, we want to help them minimize their liability with sexual abuse or sexual misconduct. So basically what you've got happening here is that somebody actually abuses a child while serving in the church, and the reason why it's the number one reason the church has ended up in court is because there is a definite line of liability when that happens. So if the church isn't taking steps to actually prevent that from happening, then they're going to be held liable. So there, what I would call, is there's community standards that a church must follow to give themselves a defense. It will not either still going to be sued, but at least it will give them a defense. Is the church following the community standards such as what schools do and other nonprofits do in order to prevent this from happening? And did they take those steps?
Perfect. I'll have some questions for you along the way, but do you mind going ahead and jumping into what are some ways that church leadership can mitigate this issue? How can they manage against that risk, both from happening, but also once it happens, minimizing the liability?
Okay. So first thing that they should do is have a written application for everybody that actually volunteers to work with children, all the employees, and anybody that has a key to the building. So that's number one. They should let, make everybody, number two, go through an interview process to discuss what they're going to be doing and make sure that they're comfortable with that person. Okay. Number three, they should run everybody, everybody should go through a background check. That background check should be a criminal background check along with a sexual, you know, checking the registered sex offender list. Okay. Number four would be a reference check, and the reference check is really easy, and I've got a form online that we can make available to everybody, but basically it ascertains their ability to work with children and is there any issues with them working with children? So they will actually give the name; you don't even have to mail it; you can actually call people and fill it out at the same time, but just make sure there's no issues with them working with children.
So a quick question on, yeah, on that subject. Obviously, a church should do that if someone is looking to be hired by the church and a staff type role or a pastor type role. Obviously, I would assume those all those background checks need to happen, but you're saying that that also needs to happen for any volunteer with the church?
Correct. Correct. Any volunteer and anybody that has a key to the building. Okay. So if you have a janitor service or anything like that, because it was a Supreme Court ruling in California where a janitor had the ability to get a child alone, and because of that we've had anybody that has keys to the building because the church was held liable for that.
Got it. So the next one would be the two-adult rule, and there's a lot of confusion on this two-adult rule, and basically what it means is that there's two adults in the room with the children; no child is left alone. Now here's the thing: if you have a lot of children and one adult, I get asked this all the time. Okay, Jerry, I know you say the two-adult rule, but if I have one, one teacher and I got five kids, is that okay? And the, and the answer is actually yes, as long as you're meeting the standards that are actually in our risk management guide based on the age of the students, how many teachers need to be in that room. The difference is is that you do not let a child be alone with the teacher, so they never are alone. You bring somebody else in the room. Somebody needs to go to the restroom; you do not go to the restroom with a child. I mean, that's the number one place that sexual abuse happens is in the restroom, so okay, you have to be very protective.
Thing you mentioned a couple of things. I would try to remember to say this at the end, but in case I don't, I just want to remind everybody the risk management guide that Jerry just referred to, along with some of the different forms that you can use, it's a free resource for you at AGfinancial.org. If you go to the insurance section, you'll find some forms and resources available. We definitely recommend you use that. That's something that we work hard to provide as a free resource to bless the churches with.
And I appreciate you doing that. Yeah, and actually it's a very, it's changing because of the court cases. So as court cases change and the community standards change, we actually try to change the book to pick up, just like we talked about with people having keys to the church that they have to go through a background check.
Good. The last step that we do is is have the people be a member of the church for six months. Okay. A lot of people want workers as quick as they can in with children, sure, but I would tell you if you can wait six months so you get to know those people beforehand, it's just a lot, it, you know, it's a lot better rule to follow. So those, those are really six steps. If you're doing those six steps, you've given yourself a great defense when that allegation comes.
That's great advice. So let's take the scenario that we're an actual situation happens; there's sexual misconduct in the church. How should a pastor deal with something so weighty and so horrible, especially those who have never dealt with that before? What do they need to think of?
Well, first of all, you need to know that clergy are mandatory reporters in most states. Okay. So they do have to report an allegation. So the first thing that they need to know is what is your state's definition of sexual misconduct, and what do you have to report? And this differs by state, so and some of them are questionable. So, for instance, I had a phone call just this last week, and it was a 16-year-old with an 18-year-old. Okay. And in most states that would still be statutory rape, but in this state because there was only two years difference between their ages and because the person was not under the age of 15, right, it was still statutory rape, but the it was not a mandatory report.
Oh, interesting. So the pastor that called me about that, it was not a mandatory report, but it is still statutory rape. Now we actually suggested that they go ahead and call the County Sheriff to go ahead and report it, sir, just so that they were safe and they would not be held responsible if something comes back. But knowing your, knowing your state mandatory reporting laws is very important. So that's the first thing you need to do when you get an allegation; you need to report it to the proper authorities immediately. So if you wait and somebody else finds out and they found out that you know, then you could be held personally liable for that.
Personally liable? Yes, because you're the person that did not report it.
Interesting. And that has actually happened in states, so they have gone after people for not doing that. Okay. So number three, actually, that—
Interrupt you real quick. So if a pastor or a staff member or, you know, as a mandatory reporter, our board members or trustees or elders, whatever the church may call it, or if they know about it but it's not being reported, are they also liable if they know about it?
Yes. Anybody. That's the reason why if you're the board and something came before the board, okay, and they discussed the matter, I would tell you be very careful what you put in your minutes because whatever comes into, you know, goes into your minutes of your board meeting actually could be used against you. Okay. So you have to be very careful what goes in the minutes, but once those board members find out, they should demand that the pastor go ahead and report it because actually they can be held personally responsible also.
Okay, thank you. So the next is to notify your insurance company. A lot of people don't understand sexual, you know, what's amazing is I sell insurance also as well as do risk management. Most insurance companies give a lower limit for sexual abuse coverage. Now if that's the number one reason why churches end up in court, why would they not give a higher limit? Well, the main reason is because people aren't doing those things to minimize the liability. The more you do to minimize that liability, the more insurance companies are willing to give a higher limit. Okay. So number one, we suggest they do those things and then request a higher limit from their insurance company.
Is that something that they proactively should talk to their agent about?
Absolutely. Okay. But once an allegation happens, they need to go ahead and notify their insurance company, even though they have not been sued or anything like that. Once an allegation happens, because under their policy, and I'm going to tell you under most policies, yeah, they, the policy actually says you'll let us know once you know of an allegation. So if they do not say anything, they could act, the insurance company could end up coming back and saying you did not let, let us know about this when this allegation happened. Now it's a year later, and now we're being sued, and you didn't let us know when it happened; we didn't have the proper time to investigate it. So you didn't let us know, then we're not paying for it. Now what's your—
So you know that's the next thing. Again, I said beware of what you put in minutes for a board meeting, right? Take the matter seriously. Don't make the victim feel bad; don't blame the victim. So that, you know, you've got to really, really need to watch over that victim and make them feel that they're loved and it's not their fault.
Sure, which is, in my opinion, the place of the church, if it truly is that community that they rally around that person. But if it is a youth pastor that that supposedly did this, sometimes they rally around the youth pastor because—
Have you seen that?
I have actually seen that. Really? We had a youth pastor, the youth pastor had a wife and a child, baby child, and they said there's no way that this happened, and and they're rallied around the youth pastor, and they rallied around the youth pastor. So of course there was a lawsuit. Well, and I will tell you that the youth pastor was found guilty, was arrested, and the church was devastated. But the reason why the it came out in court was that the victim said basically you were blaming me for what happened, and that is not, you know, that was completely not right. So you need to be very careful about that. The other thing that I would tell you is once an allegation has happened, you suspend that person immediately. You can suspend them with pay, but you suspend them until a full investigation has taken place.
Good. The other thing is document the allegations, put everything down in writing, and preserve any evidence. You want to make sure that you have, if you've done, if you did background checks, you want to make sure you have that. If you've got your references, you want to make sure that you have that. The allegations, I would get permission when the people come in and say, can I record this? Go ahead and preserve all that evidence because you're going to need that information down the road. And then the most important thing, which I mentioned a little bit, but respond compassionately to the victim and their family. Yeah, I would actually even suggest the church offer counseling free of charge. So make them feel loved because people really still do not want to sue their church, but if you give it, but if you do not come around them, you don't really give them a choice.
Sure. So those are the mixes; that's the response plan that we would follow.
Okay, perfect. Which leaves us to the very important topic of how do you deal with the media when the press is knocking on your door? They want some kind of a sound clip; there's a chance that you're going to end up on the night, you know, the nightly news. What does a pastor or church leader need to know about that interaction?
You know, the first thing that I would tell you is that when this sort of thing happens, and a lot of times is you and I have seen, the pastor finds out from the news crew and does not find out from somebody else. I mean, all of a sudden the news crews there and saying what happened here and what did you do to prevent this and why, how could you let this happen? And the pastor is sitting there going, we don't even know what happened.
Sure. So the first thing that I would tell you is actually have a designated spokesperson for the church, you know, right now. So even before anything happens, have a designated spokesperson. Have them practice what they will say. Remember that no matter what the questions are asked, TV crews, 30 seconds.
Okay, okay. So I'm going to give you the answers to their questions, no matter what the questions are.
Interesting. Okay. So they're, they're wanting that 30 seconds, and they're wanting a response.
Sure. So basically here's four questions, the answers: We've had an incident; the incident is currently under investigation; we don't have all the details at this time; we are now and we will always cooperate with the authorities.
It's good. So those are the four answers, and you just leave it at that, no matter what the question is, right? Uh, you know, we're very sorry for any potential victim; we try to, you know, we, you don't want to go too much further than that. Okay. The things to not do is don't lie or mislead. Sure. You don't want to say too much. So again, shorter is better.
What about saying no comment? Is that also—
That is very bad. Okay. If you say no comment, that means that you're hiding something, but it insinuates guilt, and it doesn't. Okay. And you gotta remember when it comes to sexual abuse or sexual misconduct, it is as much the church's reputation that's at stake, not just, you know, will insurance cover this. Sure. How the church handles this is seen and is seen by the public is just as important to that church because you've got people coming to the church and they're going, boy, that happened at that church, and they have no comment. Yeah, it makes the church look really bad. The reputation, just from being in the news for this kind of subject, is going to be bad news for them to begin with, and then you remember the most important thing is you don't have to answer the questions that are asked. So, but when you take steps to minimize that liability, again, the reason why we started with minimizing, taking steps to minimize that risk by doing that six-step process, the reason why we do that is so when or if something happens like this, you've got a defense and you can, you know, it would be real good if you had that designated, designated person say we take, we try to take the necessary steps; we meet the community standard of what churches and schools and and nonprofits do in our area to try to protect our people. When you put stuff out there like that, people are going to go, wow, this is, you know, this church is doing what it takes; this is just an unfortunate incident.
Okay, Jerry, thanks for hitting such a sensitive topic, but something that obviously is very prevalent today. Again, the number one issue that churches enter into litigation. So thank you for that. I will say this is not only a big topic but it's a topic that pastors have a lot of questions about, and I know you've received a lot of phone calls from pastors around the country. I definitely invite you to look at AGfinancial.org for the various resources we have on this topic and other topics. If you have very specific questions, I know that you've opened yourself up to answer questions from different pastors, even if you don't work with AG Financial. That's one of the things I love about you; you give practical advice for pastors, but you're open to answering questions and helping them that out in those times and situations that they might be stuck in. So thank you. Though, for watching Risk Management Live, we hope you have found this useful. I definitely stay tuned, and every month we provide great insights on risk management issues for the church, and we'll be back next month to provide more insights and topics on church risk management. You can follow us at AG Financial on Twitter; it's at AG Financial. And any questions you might have for Jerry Sparks and also for Rich Hammer who helps out, you can address those questions to us through Twitter at AG Financial, or you can address those two's via email at riskmanagementlive@agfinancial.org. That's riskmgmtlive@agfinancial.org. Thanks a lot, Jerry. Appreciate your time.
Thanks, Andy.