SALT LAKE CITY (UT)
The Associated Press
August 13, 2018
By Lindsay Whitehurst
A judge is refusing to dismiss a lawsuit by a woman claiming she was raped by a Mormon church leader who was allowed oversee young missionaries despite a history of sexual misconduct.
A woman’s lawsuit claiming she was raped by a Mormon church leader who was allowed to oversee young missionaries despite a history of sexual misconduct will go forward, a judge decided Monday.
The decision will allow McKenna Denson’s lawyers to investigate whether there are others who claim to be victims of Joseph L. Bishop, who oversaw hundreds of young people as president of the Missionary Training Center in the 1980s, or others in leadership positions, attorney Craig Vernon said.
“The church represented to McKenna and everybody else that he was good guy, he was safe and he was trustworthy, he was not a sexual predator, he was not a sexual addict,” Vernon said. “We believe there is evidence the church in fact knew that was not true.”
The Associated Press doesn’t usually name people who say they are victims of sexual assault, but Denson has said she wants her story to be public.
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