Texas Pastor Ordered to Pay $124M to Woman He’s Accused of Sexually Assaulting
A jury has ordered a Texas pastor to pay over 120 million dollars in damages to a woman who sued him for sexually assaulting her when she was a minor.
In 2017, Jose Francisco Bernal was a pastor at the Tabernaculo De Vida Pentecostal Church in Fort Worth when he was arrested after two women came forward and alleged abuse between 2007-2013 when they were minors.
He was charged with two felony counts of continuous sexual assault of a child but released on bail. He was indicted in 2019 and eventually went to trial in 2022, which was declared a mistrial after a jury could not reach a verdict. Following the loss, prosecutors declined to seek a new trial, and his criminal charges were dismissed.
Despite the loss in court, one of the women filed a civil lawsuit against him and the church. The church settled and agreed to pay her $100,000, along with signing over the deed to their church property. As for Bernal, The Fort Worth Star-Telegram explains:
Eleven of the 12 jurors in this week’s civil trial agreed that Bernal sexually abused the victim and intentionally caused her severe emotional distress.
The jury reached a verdict to award the victim a total of $124 million, to be paid by Bernal. The total judgment amount includes $11 million for mental anguish sustained in the past, $20 million for the mental anguish that the victim might sustain in the future, and $93 million for exemplary damages, court records show.
The victims’s attorney, Brian Butcher, said that while Bernall is almost certainly unable to pay the full amount, they will do all they can to help her collect and that the size of the penalty helps “restore trust in church institutions by holding somebody accountable for doing despicable things and using God’s name to do it.”
“Churches above every other place in America should be places where children are nurtured and kept safe. There has been an epidemic of clerical abuse scandals that has deeply eroded the objectives that parents are trying to reach by taking their kids to church, which is to teach them about faith and to have them be a part of a supportive and loving community.”
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Thank you for posting this expose of an example of sin inside the church. To me, it matters not if a politician has a little R after his name, or a man has a title such as pastor in front of his name. These monsters can repent and be forgiven, but even if so, they still must face the consequences of their wrong moral choices.
Jesus said this about that:
But whoso shall cause one of these little ones who believe in Me to fall, it were better for him that a millstone were hung about his neck, and that he were drowned in the depth of the sea.
—Matthew 18:6