18-0 Application for Relief

June 25th, 2021

     Excerpt:

PETITIONER’S APPLICATION FOR CASE MANAGEMENT ORDER

Petitioner Ivy Hill Congregation of Jehovah’s Witnesses hereby submits this Application for Case Management Order, and in support thereof, avers as follows:

I. BACKGROUND

1. The Petition for Review before the Court seeks declaratory relief on two discrete matters: (1) whether the elders of the Ivy Hill Congregation of Jehovah’s witnesses can assert the clergymen’s privilege incorporated into the Child Protective Services Law, and, if not, (2) whether the statutory codification of the clergymen’s privilege is unconstitutional in part.

2. These questions were put before the Court by Ivy Hill in an application for summary relief.

3. By Order dated June 17, 2021, the Court denied the application.

4. In the accompanying Memorandum Opinion, the Court explained its rationale for denying the application, stating in relevant part as follows: “There is no evidentiary record at this junction concerning matters such as the doctrine and organization of Petitioner or Jehovah’s Witnesses upon with to make” a determination whether the elders fall within the statutory clergymen’s privilege. See Memorandum Opinion at 22-23.

5. With this matter now past the initial stages, the case will
proceed to discovery.