SALT LAKE CITY (Legal Newsline) – A disillusioned Mormon can sue the church, a federal judge has decided.
Judge Robert Shelby had thrown out the proposed class action of Laura Gaddy, a former member of the church who says she became emotionally devastated when she learned what she was taught regarding the founding of the religion might not be true. She says she is currently in counseling.
But in a July 28 order that dismissed most of her amended lawsuit, Shelby allowed Gaddy to pursue a claim for racketeering and to file a second amended complaint.
That claim pertains to alleged misrepresentations concerning the Mormon Church’s use of tithing.
“The inquiry required to adjudicate this claim does not implicate religious principles of the Church or the truth of the Church’s beliefs concerning the doctrine of tithing,” Shelby wrote.
“This claim further does not require the court to determine whether the Church or its members were acting in accord with what they perceived to the commandments of their faith. Gaddy has instead challenged secular representations concerning the use of money received by the Church.
“While the statements were made by Church officials, the church autonomy doctrine does not apply as a defense.”
Gaddy alleges that the church leaves out pertinent information about its history and founder Joseph Smith and that key facts the church teaches are "radically different" than its actual history.
Gaddy claims that the church, in its account of Smith's first vision, leaves out information found in Smith's own handwritten account, some of it relating to his practice of polygamy.
Shelby has refused to entertain her claims, declaring the First Amendment bars them when they require a court to consider the truth or falsity of a church’s religious doctrines.
Shelby wrote in an earlier order that he “can no more determine whether Joseph Smith saw God and Jesus Christ or translated with God’s help gold plates or ancient Egyptian documents, than it can opine on whether Jesus Christ walked on water or Muhammed communed with the archangel Gabriel. The First Amendment prohibits these kinds of inquiries in courts of law.”
Gaddy now argues the church lied through the mail and wire communications about how it planned to use tithing funds. She says it used several billions of dollars for business expenses, including the development of City Creek Mall.