Nine male Jehovah’s Witnesses in Pennsylvania are accused of child sexual abuse in what some call the most comprehensive investigation into what goes on inside the church.

A similar grand jury investigation into child sexual abuse by Catholic priests concluded that (hundreds of priests) had been abusing children in Pennsylvania for seven decades and that church officials covered it up.

The documents that have been made public so far do not address acts of systematic cover-up of child abuse within Jehovah’s Witnesses. Critics, however, say church elders view child sexual abuse as a sin, not a crime.while recording incidents without reporting them to the authorities.

Dozens of witnesses testified before a secret grand jury in Harrisburg or provided information to prosecutors, and some say investigators were particularly interested in how the church had responded to the harassment allegations.

“Do you really want to defame the name of Jehovah?”

Martin Howe of York Haven, Pennsylvania, a former elder who left the church in 2016, said he spent hours talking with investigators about the structure and how it handles child abuse cases. Howe also testified about how his daughter was molested in 2005 by a criminal with a history who was allowed to join the church despite knowing what had happened. He himself said that the elders asked him: “Do you really want to defame the name of Jehovah?“.