A man who was sexually abused between the ages of 6 and 12 has sued the now-convicted perpetrator, the perpetrator's father and The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
Now in his 20s, the man is named only as A. Doe in the lawsuit, which alleges that the church did not protect him from the child molester when he was a boy.
Named in the suit is Mitchell Blake Young, who was convicted in 1993 of sexually abusing the plaintiff. The abuse occurred repeatedly between 1987 and 1992.
Young was initially charged with three counts of first-degree felony sexual abuse of a child. He later pleaded guilty to three counts of second-degree felony sexual abuse of a child and was sentenced to up to 15 years in the Utah State Prison, according to court records.
The lawsuit alleges that Mitchell Young's father, Gordon Young, told A. Doe's mother she should let her son receive religious instruction from Mitchell Young even though the elder Young knew his son was on probation for sexually abusing children in Arizona.
In 1985, Mitchell Young was convicted of molesting two children, ages 4 and 7, in Maricopa County, Ariz., and was granted probation, according to the suit.
The suit said church leaders and Gordon Young wrote letters to the court urging leniency and probation instead of prison.
The suit claims that by 1985 the defendants in the suit "knew that (Mitchell) Blake (Young) was an extremely dangerous serial predatory pedophile who was unsafe to be unsupervised, even for a moment, around children, and further knew that plaintiff's mother was totally unaware of the danger (he) presented to A. Doe."
The lawsuit said Gordon Young and many LDS church leaders, including bishops and stake presidents, "failed and refused to warn" the boy's mother that the younger Gordon was a danger to her son.
As a result of the abuse, the victim has suffered physical and emotional pain, incurred costs for psychological treatment and has lost earning capacity, the lawsuit said.
The civil suit filed in 3rd District Court on Monday seeks damages to be determined at trial.
"We have not seen it yet, so there's not really much we can say," said LDS Church spokesman Mike Otterson.
Although he could not address the specifics of this lawsuit, Otterson said he could address the LDS Church's stand generally on such things. "The church has long had a zero-tolerance policy toward child abuse, and we're determined to eliminate this child abuse as far as it's possible."
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