KANSAS CITY (MO)
Kansas City Star [Kansas City MO]
August 22, 2024
By Judy L. Thomas
A law firm hired by the International House of Prayer-Kansas City to examine how it handled sexual misconduct allegations faces criticism that its founder has been a defense attorney for ministries and won’t conduct an impartial investigation.
IHOPKC hired Telios Law to determine why a former volunteer youth group leader and musician was still involved with the organization years after being banned over allegations of sexual misconduct with teen boys. The firm also is tasked with helping create a safe environment for children within the 24/7 global ministry.
The news that IHOPKC had hired Theresa Sidebotham and her Colorado-based Telios Law prompted immediate backlash last week from some who have had dealings with the firm. They said that in previous investigations, Sidebotham had tried to minimize the damage done to organizations’ reputations and in some cases re-traumatized victims.
In an Aug. 12 statement, Audrey Luhmann said that the Anglican Church in North America hired Telios Law in January 2022 to investigate allegations of spiritual abuse against its bishop and several clergy in the Upper Midwest Diocese.
Luhmann said many who submitted reports or interviewed with Telios “felt challenged, disbelieved, or misrepresented in the individual summary letters Telios later sent back to them.” “ …
In short, the investigation felt like a sham,” Luhmann said. “It was a waste of the denomination’s money, a misuse of the witnesses’ time, and was re-traumatizing and demeaning for survivors.”
Sidebotham told The Star that her role when hired by an organization usually focuses on prevention and training or conducting or advising on investigations. She also has done some occasional defense work and plaintiff work, she said in an email on Friday.
“Where possible, we emphasize healing and reconciliation instead of litigation, which usually exacerbates the harm to everyone involved,” she said. “Of course, an investigative role means that I could not and would not do any defense work or plaintiff work.”
If an organization fails to prevent abuse, train, evaluate its leadership and respond to those it harmed, Sidebotham said, “it has failed in its mission.”
“If you look at my website and writings, you’ll see that I’m very candid about these goals with my clients, and I believe that is why they choose to work with us,” she said. “IHOPKC has expressed to me that they have chosen us to help them create a safe environment, respond well to anyone who comes forward, and evaluate leadership conduct.”
TRAINING BEGINS IN SEPTEMBER
IHOPKC issued a statement on Aug. 10 announcing it had hired Sidebotham’s firm. The statement came a day after The Star published the story of a man who said he was sexually abused in 2010 by a former IHOPKC youth group leader.
The statement said IHOPKC had hired Sidebotham weeks earlier “to help us build a culture that prevents sexual harassment and child endangerment.”
IHOPKC said Sidebotham would begin leading a training series in September on how to ensure children are safe and protected.
What the statement didn’t say, however, was that Sidebotham also was asked to look into the allegations made by Justin Werner that his former IHOPKC youth group leader, Larry Lucky, raped Werner when he was 16 and was seeing Lucky for private counseling at his home.
Werner went public with his story in The Star on Aug. 9, and other former IHOPKC youth alleged that Lucky had taken teen boys to the gym and asked them to shower with him.
IHOPKC denied that Lucky had led a youth group or had any key role in its Student Ministries program but said Lucky had been playing bass guitar on a worship team in the organization’s 24/7 Prayer Room and was dismissed in 2010 after a parent reported that he was showering with teen boys at a local gym.
But Facebook posts in 2008 and 2009 indicate that Lucky indeed was leading a youth group of boys. And social media posts and archived videos show that Lucky was playing in the all-night Prayer Room years beyond the date IHOPKC said he was terminated, leaving many to question whether he ever was dismissed at all.
Lucky called the allegations “fabrications” and said in a July 31 email to The Star that Werner was not 16, but 18, at the time of their meetings. The legal age of consent in Missouri is 17. Lucky said in a follow-up email on Aug. 2 that he would not comment further to The Star but welcomed a true third-party investigation.
TRYING TO UNCOVER DETAILS
In its Aug. 10 statement, IHOPKC said The Star had “published a story concerning heartbreaking allegations that 15 years ago, an adult male engaged in inappropriate sexual contact with teenage boys in incidents that occurred off campus and outside of his role at IHOPKC.”
“We have been actively working to uncover details and offer support to the victims and their families in light of this devastating news,” the statement said, adding that “we first became aware of the allegations through a reporter’s inquiry just days ago and immediately launched an investigation with the help of independent experts.”
IHOPKC said it was examining all records in its possession “to understand what occurred and how it was handled.”
Werner said Sidebotham emailed him Aug. 5 — four days after The Star first contacted IHOPKC seeking comment about Lucky.
“I am writing to follow up on your report to The Kansas (City) Star of having been sexually abused by a man associated with IHOPKC,” she wrote. “I am so very sorry to hear about your experience, and I recognize how painful and challenging this time must be for you.”
She said IHOPKC “has requested that I conduct an independent investigation into these matters.”
“I am aware that there may be an ongoing law enforcement investigation, and we would want to support that in any way possible,” she wrote. “However, we also seek to better understand your experience to ensure a thorough investigation. And there may be others who were harmed, and talking to you would be the best foundation for us to gather information to support others.”
Sidebotham asked if Werner would be open to meeting with her for an interview “to share your story.”
Werner told her he’d decided not to talk about the issue at least until the police investigation was complete.
In an email to The Star on Friday, IHOPKC said Sidebotham and Telios Law “are not investigating the sexual abuse allegations against Mr. Lucky, as that is in the hands of law enforcement.”
“They are investigating how former leadership responded to the allegations against Mr. Lucky, and are charged with identifying any failures or mishandlings, including whether mandatory reporting was carried out.”
IHOPKC TO MAKE ‘IMPORTANT’ FINDINGS PUBLIC
IHOPKC said it also hopes to identify whether anyone else was harmed.
“And if so,” it said, “we will promptly report that.”
IHOPKC asked those who may have been harmed or have knowledge about abuse “to please reach out to us, as this may be helpful for the investigation. Anyone who has been harmed should also contact the police.”
According to IHOPKC, “No former leaders from that time are currently employed by or in positions of influence with IHOPKC; thus they will have no input whatsoever.
“Rest assured that important findings of this investigation will be made public.”
IHOPKC told The Star that Telios Law also will audit its current policies “to ensure a comprehensive response to any reports, and that all possible measures are built into a culture dedicated to preventing something of this nature from happening again.”
“We hope and believe that individuals who have felt let down in the past will come to view this investigation, training, and policy update as a pivotal moment in accountability, change, and healing,” it said.
Many former staffers and leaders, however, don’t trust IHOPKC to do the right thing. They point to an independent investigation it commissioned in 2018 of staffer Brad Tebbutt. He was accused that year by a Washington woman of sexually abusing her for 2 ½ years in the 1980s starting when she was 14 and he was a 27-year-old youth pastor at a Baptist church in California.
When she came forward, Tebbutt was the director of an IHOPKC ministry for those 50 and older. IHOPKC put Tebbutt on administrative leave and hired GRACE, a Virginia nonprofit whose name stands for Godly Response to Abuse in the Christian Environment, to conduct a third-party investigation.
The investigation was completed in early 2019, but IHOPKC did not release the results.
Last November, however, a 15-page executive summary of the findings was leaked. The report, dated Jan. 31, 2019, concluded that though evidence was not raised during the investigation that Tebbutt sexually abused anyone in the IHOPKC community, “the evidence shows that Mr. Tebbutt repeatedly exploited the access and trust granted him by Jane Doe and by the church (in California) by sexually abusing a youth in his care from a position of spiritual authority.”
Among GRACE’s recommendations was for leaders to decide whether Tebbutt would be permitted to return to IHOPKC.
“Without a proven demonstration of authentic repentance, Brad Tebbutt’s employment and association with IHOP should be terminated,” the report said. “Should he be permitted to return to IHOP, he must never be allowed on the property when minors are present. In addition, he must never be allowed at, or granted participation in, any off-campus IHOP activities in which minors are present.”
Despite the recommendations, Tebbutt was promoted to a position that allowed him to be in contact with minors.
The GRACE report also warned IHOPKC leaders that additional allegations against others associated with the ministry had surfaced that needed to be immediately investigated. Failure to do so and to implement recommended changes, the report said, “is likely to result in continued missteps when handling and responding to misconduct issues at IHOP.”
As the Tebbutt investigation was underway in 2018, Lucky was playing sets in the Prayer Room — despite being banned eight years earlier.
OTHERS CRITICIZE FIRM’S METHODS
Others who have been involved with Telios Law investigations criticized its tactics as well.
Investigative journalist Rebecca Hopkins wrote on Substack Aug. 12 of her experience with the firm last year after she became a whistleblower regarding Mission Aviation Fellowship, one of the largest mission aviation organizations in the world. She said she and 15 other MAF missionaries had documented aviation safety concerns and what they saw as problematic sexual behavior of married missionary pilots with women overseas.
Sidebotham’s investigation, Hopkins said, “largely exonerated MAF of wrongdoing.” Of the whistleblowers’ 35 original concerns, she said, the report substantiated abuse of power or spiritual abuse in only one case. And the conclusions about their situation, she said, in her view included many inaccuracies “that favored leaders’ accounts over ours.”
“She didn’t quote from any of the 300 pages of documentation we’d provided,” Hopkins wrote. “It seemed to me like she was simply taking leaders’ word for it. In several cases she wrote that there were no corroborating witnesses to back up our claims, even though she never came back to us to say she needed more corroboration. I later learned she chose not to interview our entire list of witnesses either.”
Luhmann, of the Anglican Church in North America, and a representative from another ministry issued statements in collaboration with Hopkins’ story.
Attorney Libby Magee Coles said that in 2021, the Telios firm investigated allegations of “spiritual abuse” by leadership at the church she helped start in 2013.
Coles said the investigation “lacked appropriate independence, transparency, and care for participants.”
“It appeared that participants would risk significant re-traumatization and further harm if they participated and that, even assuming the best of intentions by Telios Law and Church Leadership, the investigation process was set up such that it would protect the Church institution and its leaders,” Coles said.
In her response to The Star last week, Sidebotham said that “while I do not think Ms. Hopkins’ article fairly represents our work, we are not able to comment specifically on investigations.”
She added, however, that “the investigations you reference did make findings of abuse, mismanagement, and/or a need for process changes, healing, and justice.”
Sidebotham said her firm also recommended numerous improvements the organizations could make, including ways to help those who were harmed whether or not abuse was substantiated.
“It’s understandable that persons would be hurt and upset if their specific allegations could not be substantiated,” she said. “Unfortunately, it’s impossible for every investigation to substantiate all allegations. That does not necessarily mean a determination that the allegation is false, only that we did not meet the standard of proof of preponderance of the evidence.”
NOT THE FIRST INVESTIGATION
This isn’t the first time IHOPKC has come under fire for hiring a law firm to investigate sex abuse allegations. When IHOPKC founder Mike Bickle was accused last fall of sexually abusing multiple women over several decades, IHOPKC originally hired the Stinson LLP law firm — a national firm with an office in Kansas City — to investigate, but quickly reversed that decision after critics questioned whether it could be impartial.
Then it hired Audrey Manito, an attorney with close ties to IHOPKC, to conduct interviews with those alleging abuse. When that action was heavily criticized, IHOPKC hired Rosalee McNamara of the Lathrop GPM firm to conduct an outside investigation.
But Bickle’s alleged victims and those supporting them, who have become known as the Advocate Group, declined to talk to McNamara, saying her firm couldn’t be impartial because it also has represented defendants in sex abuse cases.
McNamara released the findings of her investigation earlier this year. She found that Bickle “more likely than not” engaged in inappropriate behavior that included sexual contact and clergy misconduct. Critics, however, said the abuse and coverups extended beyond Bickle and that until a real third-party investigation was conducted, the full truth would remain hidden.
Boz Tchividjian, a Florida attorney who specializes in sex abuse cases and is representing some of Bickle’s alleged victims, said he had concerns about whether the Telios firm would be truly unbiased.
“An ‘independent investigator’ who has previously represented churches or Christian organizations in sexual abuse claims is not ‘independent’ and cannot be trusted,” he posted last week on X. “Your abuse experience has immeasurable importance and value … please only share it with those who have earned your trust.”