Church Sues Woman After Negative Google Review

[Dakota Valkyrie]

Julie Smith / Pastor Charles O'Neal

A church pastor is suing a mother and daughter for $500,000 because they gave the church bad reviews online.

The family being sued left the church a few years ago and Julie Anne Smith says she and her family were shunned and couldn't understand why. So she went online and wrote Google and DEX reviews of the church and then started a blog.

"I thought, I'm just going to post a review," Smith said. "We do it with restaurants and hotels and whatnot, and I thought, why not do it with this church?"

Never did she think Beaverton Grace Bible Church and Pastor Charles O'Neal would slap her with the lawsuit.

"I'm a stay-at-home mom. I teach my kids at home, and this is just not the amount of money that normal moms have."

When the family left the church, Smith says friends were told to end all contact with her.

"If I went to Costco or any place in town, if I ran into somebody, they would turn their heads and walk the other way," she said. "All we did was asked questions. We just raised concerns. There's no sin in that."

Dissatisfied, she went online to write reviews. Other church members counteracted them with church praise. So Smith started a blog called "Beaverton Grace Bible Church Survivors."

But the pastor claims in the lawsuit he filed that her words, "creepy," "cult," "control tactics," and "spiritual abuse," are defamation.

"What somebody does in the church is one thing, but when you get out into society we have the right to free speech, and it may not be what people want to hear, but we absolutely have that right," Smith said.

The lawsuit didn’t just target Smith. Her daughter and three other commenters are also being sued.

"He can say what he wants in the church and say, don't talk about this or don't talk about that, or don't talk to this person, but when you're out in the civil world, you don't do that anymore," Smith said. "And he's not my pastor anymore. He does not have that right to keep people from talking."

http://www.katu.com/news/local/Beave...151227055.html

Smith posted her concerns about the church in a Google review, but said her comments kept disappearing.

"Since my voice was removed from Google and was not staying there, I felt like I needed a place to have a voice," she said.
[...]

Attorney Linda Williams represents Smith and says cases like this rarely go to trial in Oregon. She believes this lawsuit is frivolous because of free speech protections and the high damage request.

"It would be extremely difficult to determine that wording or posting caused that tremendous $500,000 worth of damage," she said. "It just didn't."
[...]

"If Chuck O'Neil wins, I think all the bloggers and people who have sites on the Internet better be shaking in their boots," said Smith

The Smiths have filed a motion to dismiss the lawsuit, which goes before a judge May 21.

http://www.kgw.com/news/local/Former...151309775.html



Beaverton Grace Bible Church Survivors: http://bgbcsurvivors.blogspot.com/

I began this blog in Feb. 2012 after noticing that the Google reviews I had posted of my former church were being removed. Days after the commencement of this blog, I received a legal summons suing me and three others for defamation to the tune of $500,000.

Beaverton Grace Bible Church on Google Maps (currently rated 1 star): https://maps.google.com/maps/place?o...d=0CLoFEOIJMAA

[cubby]

WOW!

In my mind this would pretty much confirm that what she said about the church being controlling, creepy, and cultlike was more than likely true.

[AngelFire]

If this Pastor has convinced the members that they should ignore this woman and her family, and they do it I call CULT. That is most def controlling. Trolls.

[Valasca]

Uh, dumbasses. HOW do they think this is going to help the reputation of the church? Duhhhhh.

[AngelFire]

Uh, dumbasses. HOW do they think this is going to help the reputation of the church? Duhhhhh.

When my sister got pregnant out of wedlock, the church turned their backs on her. Her close friends were not allowed to hang with my sister, since she was "tainted". Fucking hypocrites. It's assholes like these that turn people away.

[Valasca]

Gotta love a "loving" group of people.

[Dakota Valkyrie]

And to him that smites you on the one cheek offer also the other ~ Luke 6:29

[newstarshipsmell]

Beaverton Grace Bible Church on Google Maps (currently rated 1 star): https://maps.google.com/maps/place?o...d=0CLoFEOIJMAA

I wonder what their average rating on Google Maps was before Pastor O'Neal enraged the internet with his frivolous lawsuit. GJ Charles!

[cubby]

The church that my grandmother attended was the one I had attended most of my life until I was about 23 and attended a youth seminar and the talk turned to abortions and I found out that I was doomed to hell regardless because I had a an abortion when I was 19 years old. Nothing could save me now. So I said fuck it and did what I wanted to do. Why try to be a good Christian woman if I was going to hell regardless of that.

Really did they think this was gonna help me? Worst thing I ever did, I admit that, wouldn't do it again, given the same set of circumstances, but I did it and I can't change it. Why rub it in my face. I was and still miserable about it.

I've not been to church since.

[AngelFire]

Why try to be a good Christian woman if I was going to hell regardless of that.

My evangelist family has pretty much scared my son. He is gay and my aunts tried to "turn him back to heterosexual". You know what their tactics were? Telling him that God condemns his homosexuality and if he wanted to be saved he needed to repent and be straight again, otherwise he will BURN in hell.

He said "why believe in God if he is only going to condemn me". It's all that shit that my family spews out of their mouth. They don't really take the time to understand the shit they are saying. Idiots, even I am starting to question stuff.

[cubby]

I can remember going to this church before they had an indoor bathroom, if you had to pee you had to go out the front door and across the parking lot all the way to furthest part of the property to use the outhouse. This was the early 60's. Then some well to do people joined and now it's one of the largest most politically active churches in town.

Every year they have a Christmas play called "From the Christ Child to the Judgement" I went exactly one time it scared me so bad I never went again. People brought small children to this and took them every year. Amazing. Half the church was decorated as heaven and half as hell, people were being dragged across the front of the church and thrown screaming into hell, with fake flames and smoke pouring out ot the large double doors. Not for me. If I believe at all I believe in a kind and loving God who forgives our trespasses.

[VXIII]

Our church used to tell us about hell and how if you arent saved your going there, then they would turn out the lights and scream and beat on the walls to scare all the kids, then after we all were terrified half to death tuen the lights back on and ask if that was the end of the world would we be going to heaven or hell, used to scare the crap out of us.

When I became a teenager I went to another church with freinds, the preacher used to say his sermon then at the end would say everyone who wants to be saved come to the front, I would stay where I was and usually would be the only one who wouldnt go up, the preacher was puzzled over that and tried really hard to get me saved. I just said Im not ready for this. I dont agree with a lot of tactics churches use to instill fear, maybe you could even call it terror in childrens hearts for a god they are supposed to love.

[Dakota Valkyrie]

Judge dismisses case where pastor sued former parishioner

A judge dismissed a lawsuit filed by a church pastor who claimed an online review of his church by a former parishioner was defamatory.

At the heart of the lawsuit was a simple question: Was the online review protected free speech, or did it cross the line into defamatory speech.

On Thursday, Washington County Judge Jim Fun sided with the defendants and dismissed the case.

“The court finds that the defendant’s internet postings on plaintiff’s website and defendant Julie Anne Smith’s blog site were made in a public forum and concern an issue of public interest,” Fun wrote in his ruling.
[...]

"This case was dismissed under Oregon's anti-SLAPP law" said Linda Williams, an attorney for the defendants. "This is a powerful tool to throw out claims which cannot ever succeed because they seek to squelch speech protected by the First Amendment and Oregon Constitution.”

“SLAPP” stands for “strategic lawsuit against public participation.” That’s a lawsuit that aims to silence somebody who you disagree with by burdening them with legal woes.

“(O’Neal) has the right to govern his congregation in the manner in which he chooses, and defendant Julie Anne Smith is authorized by law to express her disagreement with his performance of those activities,” Fun wrote in the ruling dismissing the case.

"This is what America is all about," Smith told KATU after an earlier hearing. "We need to be able to speak freely even if it's not polite or falls on ears that really (don't) want to hear this kind of thing.

http://www.katu.com/news/local/163953036.html

[cubby]

I was pretty sure that what she wrote would be protected speech, after all it was her opinion, and we all know what opinions are like and everybody has one.

I do love the Judge's name,~~~~~FUN~~~~~I wonder if he's meaner so that everybody knows he not any FUN!