UNITED KINGDOM
Sky Tyne and Wear
By Kevin Donald
Jehovah’s Witness church elders covered up a child sex scandal in their congregation and refused to co-operate with the police.
Ministerial servant Gordon Leighton admitted sexually abusing a child when he was confronted with allegations before elders at his church.
But during the official police investigation the 53-year-old, who hit the headlines in the 1990s when his wife Yvonne, 28, died after refusing a blood transfusion after childbirth on religious grounds, denied any illegal wrongdoing.
When detectives asked elders Simon Preyser, Harry Logan and David Scott to make statements about the confession, all three refused and said what they had heard was confidential.
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