A former parishioner has filed a class action lawsuit in federal court alleging she was repeatedly raped as a child by the former youth director of First Baptist Church of Hammond, Indiana, and that officials at First Baptist and the affiliated Hyles-Anderson College covered up the abuse.
Nanette Miles alleges she was sexually assaulted over a period of several years by David Hyles, the son of Hyles-Anderson College founder and longtime First Baptist pastor Jack Hyles, starting when she was 13 years old in 1976.
The civil complaint filed with the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois seeks undisclosed damages on behalf of Miles and other individuals who allegedly were harmed by Hyles, other First Baptist leaders and officials of the college.
“Nanette is seeking justice against David Hyles for his reprehensible behavior for herself and many others,” said attorney Ashley Pileika in a statement. “She is friends with at least two other women who were raped by David Hyles and struggle with severe health complications today. Nanette is courageously stepping forward to be their voices as well.”
The lawsuit says that in addition to Miles, at least 10 others “have credibly accused D. Hyles of using his position of power to sexually prey on them” when they were minors, and that “First Baptist and the College staff members were aware of his reprehensible conduct for years and remained silent.”
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The suit also said there are “likely hundreds of other survivors that were sexually abused at First Baptist and/or Hyles-Anderson College.”
It’s the second lawsuit filed against Hyles this year. In February, Joy Ryder, who now leads a non-profit support group for sex abuse victims, accused him in a civil suit of raping her repeatedly in the 1970s. The statute of limitations for a criminal suit had passed.
Miles’ attorneys from Forester Haynie PLLC and the Law Offices of Robert A. Montgomery said in a statement that by filing the case as a class action, they hope to give survivors of sexual abuse both a voice and a legal mechanism to hold accountable leaders of Independent Fundamental Baptist churches, who they say perpetrated and covered up child sex abuse for decades.
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nrLNRQhbZ-A
Unimaginable what’s been allowed to happen. This YT channel has a lot of footage on David and Jack Hyles:
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCCeEzY-PmjRBy2sdvaNHhdw/search?query=jack
Its a wonder Dave Hyles doesn’t have some sort of STD…this story is the gift that keeps on giving!
Silence on the part of the relevant institutions is so typical but it’s still horrifying.
Memory fails on most of the specifics, as this was in the late 80’s, but I do recall the Jesus People USA community in Chicago reporting on the Sunday School bus from a large Baptist church in Hammond that came to the poor neighborhood of Uptown, on the north side of Chicago, and picked up kids of poor, new immigrants who didn’t have a clue what was going on. With the distance, those kids would be gone for hours, and their parents not have any real notion of where they were, or what it was for. The JPUSA folks had neighborhood meetings in which they explained to the parents that they didn’t have to allow their children to go, that they had rights in America, and that there were churches much closer. I should hardly have to add that JPUSA had and continues to have a witness to the gospel in that same area of Uptown.
It seems a class action is a good move. It has gravitas and can induce reform.
Let us not forget good old son-in-law and for heir to the Hyles empire Jack Schaap doing time in the Federal pen for taking a 16 year old girl across state lines for sex. For those of you that can stomach it, here is Schaap with his infamous “polishing the shaft” sermon at FBC Hammond:
If we don’t want such things to happen we have to make sure that we all stick to the Bible! The Word of God is the truth and it leads us on the right path. I feel like many believers today only listen to preachers instead of reading the Bible themselves. I think it would be good for everyone to read this book on your own and find out what is true.
https://www.staybiblical.com/