- FORT WORTH - Six years after
Laura Schubert sued members of a Colleyville church for trying to cast
demons out of her, a Tarrant County jury's award of $300,000 filled her
with joy.
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- Because of an earlier court ruling, jurors made their
decision without hearing any religious aspects of the case, including
Schubert's
accounts of two exorcism attempts in 1996.
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- "This is a situation where religion went real
bad,"
said Schubert's father, Tom Schubert, a former Assembly of God minister
and missionary.
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- David Pruessner, an attorney for Pleasant Glade Assembly
of God Church, said an appeal is likely. The pastor and some church members
were found liable for abusing and falsely imprisoning Schubert, who was
17 at the time.
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- Pruessner argued that Schubert was suffering from a
mental
disorder and that church members didn't harm her.
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- "We are a Bible-believing, Pentecostal church. For
this we make no apologies," pastor Lloyd McCutchen said in a
statement.
He will have to pay 50 percent of the amount awarded to Schubert. Former
youth pastor Rod Linzay, his wife, Holly Linzay, and other church members
were also found liable.
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- Schubert's lawsuit, filed six years ago, described a
bizarre night in which church members anointed the sanctuary with holy
oil, rapped on pews and propped a cross against the church doors to keep
or drive demons out. But jurors heard none of that.
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- McCutchen, in his statement Friday, said the accusations
are "outrageous and preposterous actions of which we are not
guilty."
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- In 1998, the 2nd Court of Appeals in Fort Worth agreed
with church attorneys that discussing the denomination's doctrine on
demonic
possession would violate the church's religious freedom.
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- Instead, jurors listened for three weeks as 49 witnesses
sidestepped the religious aspects.
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- One juror, who did not give her name, said the judge
informed the jury after the trial about the exorcism attempts. The juror
said knowing those details would not have made a difference in the verdict.
She did not elaborate.
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- The trial focused on two nights in June 1996 when
Schubert
said up to eight youth group members restrained her while adult church
members watched.
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- "This was not a situation of prayer. They were
trying
to commit an exorcism on me," Schubert said.
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- Schubert, now 23, testified that the experience led her
to mutilate herself and attempt suicide and finally to seek psychiatric
treatment. Her lawsuit in 141st District Court in Fort Worth had sought
more than $500,000.
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- In closing arguments Friday, church attorney Pruessner
walked to a corner of the courtroom, sat on the floor and pulled his knees
to his chest to demonstrate how Schubert had been seeking attention in
June 1996. He said church members were only trying to help her.
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- "Laura Schubert breathes in attention the same way
we breathe in air," Pruessner said.
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- Schubert also exhibited a pattern of overdramatizing
events, he said. She endured the hardship of being uprooted while traveling
with her missionary parents, Pruessner said. Partly because of that,
Schubert
developed a mental disorder, he said.
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- "Before she ever showed up at the church, she had
a pre-existing personality disorder," Pruessner told the jury.
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- But Bill Wuester, Schubert's attorney, said the teen-
ager was a model high school student who held a job, paid for her car and
looked forward to her senior prom. That changed in June 1996, he told the
jury.
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- "This girl had no problems. ... She had a great
life," Wuester said.
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- He reminded jurors that church officials and youth group
members testified that they had pinned her to the sanctuary floor.
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- Schubert and other witnesses testified that she had
kicked
and yelled to try to break free.
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- "I don't know how many times a woman has to say
`no' before she is believed," Wuester told the jury. "How many
times does she have to say, `Get away. Don't hold me. Let me up. No!'
?"
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- But Pruessner said no amount of money would improve
Schubert's
mental health.
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- The jury was being asked to "destroy the church
and the people who have been sued," he said.
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- McCutchen, the pastor, said the verdict would not
devastate
the congregation.
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- "The church will go on," he said.
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- http://www.dfw.com/mld/dfw/2919342.htm
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