Florida Baptist Convention Ordered to Pay Pastor's Sex Abuse Victim $12.5 Million
A Florida jury has ordered the Florida Baptist Convention to pay $12.5 million to a man who was sexually abused by a Southern Baptist church planter as a boy, but the attorney representing the religious group insists the judgement will be overturned once he files an appeal.
While the jury's verdict came on Saturday, Jan. 18, Gary Yeldell, the attorney representing the Florida Baptist Convention, said on Tuesday that his client plans to appeal the Lake County jury's decision because the church planting pastor was working independently and not under the supervision of the organization at the time of the crime.
Convention spokesman Barbara Denman further explained that the abusing pastor, Douglas W. Myers, worked in the capacity as a church planter "who assisted in starting churches and received a stipend from the church," and that official hiring was done by the respective churches.
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The sex abuse survivor, an unidentified 21-year-old college student, received the favorable verdict from the jury after a six-day trial. The unanimous decision was a result of jurors grasping the "devastating" impact of the abuse, according to the man's attorney.
The Florida Baptist Convention was found liable in the case in 2012 when a jury decided that the religious organization failed to properly vet Myers, who reportedly had previously faced accusations of inappropriate contact with children. The convention did not check Myers' references or contact churches where he previously had been employed.
The 64-year-old former church planter spent seven years in prison after pleading guilty to lewd and lascivious molestation of the boy, who he met in 2005 at Bay Street Baptist Church in Lake County and abused for six months. Myers, married at the time, reportedly left a trail of sex abuse allegations in various churches where he worked during his 30-plus years in Christian ministry.
The Florida Baptist Convention, which claims 2,968 churches and missions, is affiliated with the Southern Baptist Convention. The Baptist Press reports that in 2013, "messengers to the Southern Baptist Convention annual meeting in Houston passed a resolution expressing affirmation for children and recognized the 'ever-increasing criminal offense' of the sexual abuse of children even within Southern Baptist churches." The resolution also called on SBC members to remember their legal and moral responsibility in protecting children from abuse.
