by Matthew Cullinan Hoffman
August 28, 2012 (LifeSiteNews.com) - A lawsuit filed by a homosexual against Liberty University School of Law and various other organizations and individuals for “conspiracy” and “racketeering” is based on lies and is defamatory, according to law school dean Mathew Staver, who says that he will “pursue every recourse” against the plaintiffs for having filed it.
Staver also says that the suit is an attempt to undermine the freedom of speech of pro-family groups in their opposition to homosexual behavior and homosexual parenting.
“This is outrageously frivolous,” Staver told LifeSiteNews.com. “It’s a press release filed in federal court. It is sanctionable, and we will pursue every recourse possible because this suit is defamatory. It’s filled with lies, it’s frivolous, and the attorney who filed it ought to be sanctioned…”
The suit, filed on behalf of Vermont lesbian Janet Jenkins, claims that Liberty University School of Law, Thomas Road Baptist Church, Christian Aid Ministries, and other organizations and individuals are involved in various schemes of “conspiracy” and “racketeering” for allegedly offering support for ex-lesbian Lisa Miller’s and her daughter’s escape from the United States in 2009.
Miller fled the United States after a Vermont court insisted that Jenkins, who was Miller’s ex-partner in a Vermont civil union, be given visits with Miller’s daughter, Isabella. Although Jenkins is unrelated biologically to Isabella, and never adopted her, the court awarded “parent” status to Jenkins, and continued to order visits despite evidence submitted of trauma suffered by Isabella.
After Miller’s disappearance, Vermont judge Richard Cohen ordered that the custody of Isabella be transferred permanently to Jenkins, an order that is unenforceable while Miller remains in hiding outside of the United States.
“Racketeering” churches and law schools?
The suit seeks to invoke the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO) against Liberty University’s law school because a single individual who worked there part-time allegedly sent an email to co-workers soliciting donations to be sent to Miller in Nicaragua, an event that Staver says never happened.
The suit also cites the fact that the Thomas Road Baptist Church signed the Manhattan Declaration, which endorses civil disobedience in defense of Christian values, and asserts that Liberty University teaches the same thing in its law school. It also cites an interview given by Liberty law school professor Rena Lindavaldsen with LifeSiteNews.com, in which she states that people could write to their representatives about the case, implying that participation in politics is tantamount to a criminal “conspiracy.”
The suit’s abuse of the RICO statute, according to Staver, is an attempt to silence pro-family groups, in a manner similar to that of pro-abortion groups in lawsuits against the pro-life movement in the 1990s.
“It’s exactly the same thing that happened in the 90s with pro-lifers,” Staver said. “Pro-lifers were targeted by RICO suits, people were brought into RICO complaints and intimidated into silence, because they agreed to pray to end abortion in America. They agreed to pray for a picket or a prayer rally outside of an abortion clinic, even though they hadn’t even been to the abortion clinic. People in Texas who had never been to Florida were all of a sudden named on a RICO complaint.”
Ex-lesbian and pro-family activist Linda Wall, who was a close friend of Lisa Miller in the years before her disappearance, says that various claims made regarding her in the complaint are also false.
“I have never been an agent of Thomas Road Baptist Church, and not even a member of Thomas Road Baptist Church,” said Wall. “So that’s a big error there, connecting me with that church.”
The suit also claims that Wall called law enforcement and told them not to investigate the case, and that she posted messages on Facebook encouraging people not to reveal what they know about Miller, which Wall also denies.
Wall said that she had never counseled Lisa Miller to leave the country, principally because she didn’t want Miller to blame her later if it didn’t work out. She also says she was never told by Miller that she had decided to leave, an event that surprised Wall, although she subsequently stated her personal agreement with Miller’s actions in later interviews.
A pattern of legal harassment?
The Jenkins lawsuit comes on the heels of a number of recent cases in which homosexuals have been accused of using the legal system and even law enforcement to harass pro-family activists.
The president of the Massachusetts pro-family group Mass Resistance was recently slapped with a restraining order in the state of Maine after homosexual activist and convicted sex abuser Adam Flanders complained that Camenker was “harassing” and “stalking” him, even though Camenker has never had any personal contact with Flanders and resides in another state.
The chief motive in Flanders’ complaint was that Camenker had published a public letter written by Flanders years earlier detailing the sexual exploitation of minors in a local homosexual “youth group” run by adults, and Flanders now wished it to be removed from the Mass Resistance site, a request that Camenker refused. The Maine court granted Flanders’ request for the restraining order after refusing to allow Camenker to testify by phone, something that Camenker says he was told he could do.
Following the restraining order, Flanders went on to file a multimillion dollar lawsuit against Camenker and Mass Resistance, claiming that his status as a protected minority in the state of Maine has been violated by Camenker because Mass Resistance had not removed his letter from the site. Flanders also temporarily secured the removal of all of conservative news outlet Road Kill Radio’s content from Vimeo’s video service after threatening Vimeo with a lawsuit because of Road Kill’s discussion of his case with Camenker. He has sought to silence other news sources as well, including World Net Daily, Americans for Truth About Homosexuality, and LifeSiteNews.com.
In other recent cases, homosexual activists have been accused of placing fraudulent phone calls to police, claiming that a murder or other violent event has occurred at the house of a pro-family activist, and provoking the intervention of a SWAT team at the activist’s residence. Although the origin of such attacks remains unproven, they have become known as “SWATing” in the pro-family movement.
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