Reverend Yun Case Study

INTRODUCTION
Reverend Harriet Yun (“ Reverend Yun”) and Bald Mountain Community Church (“the Church”) are being sued by the Plaintiff, Ernestine Petrillo. Plaintiff filed this suit seeking redress for the financial losses she sustained when she voluntarily entered into an ill-fated financial venture based on the advice of Reverend Rooks, a former pastor at the Church. The Plaintiff has filed a Motion to Compel Reverend Yun to answer questions regarding a confidential clergyman-penitent conversation that Reverend Yun had with a Ms. Esther Borzoi regarding allegations of Reverend Rooks’ alleged misdeeds. Plaintiff offers in support of her motion a Declaration by Borzoi that recounts the nature of the conversation and waives Borzoi’s right to
Rook’s is no longer employed by the Church and is not defending against this suit. Communications between a clergyman and his congregants on spiritual matters are viewed as special and often enjoy special evidentiary privileges. The Supreme Court of the United States recognized this in Trammel v. United States saying that it “recognizes the human need to disclose to a spiritual counselor, in total and absolute confidence, what are believed to be flawed acts or thoughts and to receive priestly consolation and guidance in return.” 445 U.S. 40, 51
Id. at 316. In the ensuing agreement between the congregant and the church, Zoghby agreed to attend counseling and to turn over record of his counseling to the archbishop so as to evaluate his progress. Id. The Alabama Supreme Court noted that a privilege can still be asserted when a communication is made to a clergyman who is serving as both a spiritual adviser and an administrator, as was the archbishop. Id. at 323. The court went on to find that the communication was not privileged because the archbishop claimed he was not acting as a spiritual counselor to Zoghby, and was acting solely as an administrator. Id. at 325. Tankersley had called Pastor Henderson, the pastor of Tankersley’s mother’s friend, distressed that his girlfriend had left him and told Pastor Henderson that he would kill her if she did not return to him. Tankersley, 724 So.2d at 560. At no time in the conversation did he say that he was talking to Henderson in her capacity as a pastor, or that he intended the conversation to be confidential. Id. The court in that case held that the discussion of distress and potential murder was within Pastor Henderson’s “professional capacity in the broadest sense.” Id. at 561. This was even though Pastor Henderson was not Tankersley’s regular pastor, and even though Tankersley admitted he did not call her because she was a pastor, but because she “loved him as a person.” Id. at