BishopAccountability.org
	Pastor Accused of Emotional Abuse By William C. Lhotka St. Louis Post-Dispatch October 17, 2007 http://www.stltoday.com/stltoday/news/stories.nsf/stlouiscitycounty/story/3FCAE384308EA433862573770016AA27?OpenDocument ST. LOUIS COUNTY — A college freshman who takes medication for depression and anxiety claims part of her distress stems from emotional abuse by a Lutheran minister in 2004, when she was 15. She testified Tuesday in her damage suit in St. Louis County Circuit Court that for three or four months she felt she was under the emotional control of the Rev. Chris Watson. He was then pastor of the Church of the Resurrection, on Sappington Road in south St. Louis County. Watson and the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod are named as defendants in a civil suit. No criminal charges were ever filed against Watson, who resigned as pastor and a minister in 2005. Watson's attorney, Thomas Magee, likened the accusation to the Salem witch hunts, telling the jury, "It is a good thing this case is in St. Louis County, not Salem, Massachusetts, 200 years ago." Magee said the plaintiff is "a girl who was lonely and lost and making up lies to get attention." Susan Carlson, attorney for the teen, who is listed only as Mary Doe in court filings, said Watson inappropriately hugged the girl for his own sexual arousal, had turned her against her own parents, had planted thoughts of suicide in her mind and had manipulated her emotions through the guise of counseling. Carlson said the church should have known about Watson's abnormal interest in young girls because Watson's ex-wife had warned another minister about him three years earlier, when he was an assistant pastor at King of Kings in Chesterfield and the couple were having marital problems. Michael Ward, attorney for the church, told the court that the Missouri Synod has no liability in the case because, unlike the Roman Catholic Church, it has no hierarchal authority over ministers. Each congregation selects and pays it own minister. Watson left the ministry in August 2005 because he was getting divorced and the Missouri Synod requires resignations in those circumstances. The girl testified that she started seeing Watson occasionally in August 2004 and then began seeing him every day after school in the office of the parsonage, behind. To avoid gossip, he would leave a basement door unlocked so she could go in unnoticed, she said. He often turned down the lights in his office, and often steered the conversation to both sex and suicide, she alleged. She claimed the relationship changed from best friend to father-daughter to a unconsummated love affair over the next two months. She alleged he had convinced her that her parents didn't love her and only he cared what happened to her. Asked by Carlson how she feels today, she said: "It scares me that I was so much under his control. … I also feel violated because sex is something you don't talk about with your minister." Magee, the defense lawyer, noted that the girl never told the first four mental health professionals she saw in 2005 about any improper relationship with Watson, and brought up the subject only with the fifth. He also read to the jury a letter or journal entry, dated Sept. 14, 2005, in which the teen had written that Watson had "nursed me back to good mental health." Watson will testify and deny anything improper in his counseling of the girl, Magee said. Contact: blhotka@post-dispatch.com | 314-615-3283
Any original material on these pages is copyright © BishopAccountability.org 2004. Reproduce freely with attribution.