High Court OKs Moon Church Trial : Lets Stand California Ruling in Recruiting Practices Case

In a case that has been watched anxiously by mainstream churches, the Supreme Court cleared the way Monday for a damages trial against the Rev. Sun Myung Moon’s Unification Church for allegedly having used trickery and brainwashing to recruit two young members.

The justices refused to hear an appeal by Moon’s lawyers on grounds that the Constitution’s guarantee of the “free exercise of religion” protected the church in proselytizing for new members.

The high court action leaves intact a California Supreme Court ruling in October that the church could be held liable for lying and deceit by its members.

Stopped on Street

The two young persons suing the church said that they were stopped by followers of Moon on a San Francisco street in 1979 and were persuaded to spend a weekend at a group farm.

Although the followers at first denied that they were “Moonies,” the two young persons were subjected at the farm to brainwashing and “coercive persuasion” that led them to join the church, the two said. Later, after spending time with “deprogrammers,” they renounced their faith in Moon’s church and filed suit seeking damages for fraud.

Officials of mainstream churches warn that the California Supreme Court ruling, if finally upheld, would threaten all organized religion. Lawyers for four groups said that the ruling, by holding that a church may be forced to pay damages for having successfully persuaded someone to become a member, would have “a serious chilling effect on religious proselytizing and conversions in California and elsewhere.”

Urge Intervention

The four groups--the National Council of Churches of Christ, the Presbyterian Church, the American Baptist Churches and the Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights--filed a brief urging the Supreme Court to intervene in the California case.

It was not clear what significance the U.S. Supreme Court attached to its decision to turn down Moon’s appeal.

The justices may believe that the California court ruling was correct and therefore should be allowed to stand. Or they may have doubts about it but prefer to let the case go to trial. If the trial results in a large damage verdict against Moon’s church, the church would almost certainly appeal again and the justices could agree to hear the case then.

“We’re not too surprised they turned it down,” said Jeffrey S. Ross, a San Francisco lawyer representing the Unification Church. “They usually want to hear a case when it’s final.”

Started With Bus Trip

The case that resulted in Monday’s Supreme Court action developed in 1979, when David Molko, a 27-year-old graduate of Temple University Law School, moved to San Francisco, and Tracy Leal, a 19-year-old San Diego college student, took a bus trip to San Francisco.

Both alleged that they were deceived into joining a Moonie group for a weekend. After several weeks of constant meetings and lectures, they decided to join the church, and Molko later contributed $6,000 to the church. In their lawsuits, they are seeking damages for emotional distress as well as punitive damages against the church.

A Superior Court judge in San Francisco and a mid-level state court threw out the suit because it clashed with the church’s freedom to practice religion. Last October, however, the state Supreme Court revived it on a 6-1 vote.

Subject to Regulation

Justice Stanley Mosk, writing for the court majority, said that religious beliefs are fully protected by the First Amendment but that religiously motivated conduct is subject to state regulation. Molko and Leal, he said, should be given the chance to prove that the church engaged in fraud to win recruits.

Without comment or dissent, the U.S. Supreme Court rejected the church’s appeal in the case (Holy Spirit Assn. for the Unification of World Christianity vs. Molko and Leal, 88-1600).

In another action, the court said that the owners of the Italian cruise ship Achille Lauro would have to defend themselves in New York in a civil suit growing out of the 1985 hijacking by Palestinian terrorists. American passengers, including Leon Klinghoffer, who was killed during the episode, bought their cruise tickets in the United States. The tickets contained a small warning that any legal actions must be brought in Naples, Italy.

But a district judge in New York ruled that the passengers’ suit may be tried here, and an appellate court said that the owners had no right to appeal before the trial. In a 9-0 ruling, the high court endorsed that conclusion (Lauro Lines vs. Chasser, 88-23).