Whether Italy will now ratify the agreement or seek Grand Chamber referral was not addressed in any government statement located in the sources reviewed; the three-month referral window runs to roughly 11 September 2026.Confirmed
Italy's decades-long failure to approve a formal State agreement (an 'intesa') kept Jehovah's Witnesses out of a system that lets taxpayers send part of their income tax to a religion, the European Court of Human Rights held in June (application no. 49687/16), awarding EUR 18,000. The ruling is still not final: as of 7 October 2026, the Court's database shows a pending request for the case to go to its top bench of 17 judges, the Grand Chamber.
· Updated October 7, 2026 · 9 min read
CanadaConfirmed
In Gutierrez v. Watchtower Bible and Tract Society of Canada, a unanimous three-judge panel ruled on 23 September 2026 that the proposed class action disclosed no valid legal claim against the Society, holding that spiritual authority alone is not enough to create a legal duty of care, and upheld the finding that a class action was not the preferable procedure. It left in place the unchallenged finding that the unnamed Canada Branch was a necessary party. The court did not rule on whether any abuse occurred.
· September 23, 2026 · 15 min read
JapanReported
The suit in the Tokyo District Court, filed in March 2025 and reported by Jiji Press in April 2026, argues that a health-ministry Q&A listing a parent's refusal of a blood transfusion a doctor judges necessary as neglect is unconstitutional, and asks for the guidelines to be set aside, with ¥2 million in damages per person. The state was contesting the claims, according to April 2026 reports; three advocacy groups for people raised in religious households criticised the suit.
· April 11, 2026 · 11 min read
JapanReported
Five Jehovah's Witnesses say two prefectural hospitals refused to treat them unless they signed a blood-transfusion consent form, and are suing Okinawa Prefecture for about ¥16.74 million. Ryukyu Shimpo reported on 17 September 2026 that at the first hearing at the Naha District Court the prefecture asked for the claims to be rejected. The allegations are unproven.
· Updated September 19, 2026 · 7 min read
UkraineConfirmed
The Eighth Appellate Administrative Court in Lviv dismissed the appeal on 3 September 2026, leaving a Rivne judgment of 16 February 2026 in place. Both judgments record, as a fact no party disputed, that an official inspection found recruitment-centre officials in breach of the Commander-in-Chief's order of 16 December 2024 barring the detention and forced delivery of clergy of registered religious organisations. Neither court treated that as a reason to cancel the call-up, the unit posting or the cadet appointment, and neither returns to the finding after listing it. Police delivered the claimant on 22 April 2025; medical board, summons, call-up order and unit posting all followed within 48 hours.
· September 3, 2026 · 20 min read
LegalReported
Meleah Thompson says she was abused as a child by men connected to her Oregon congregation in the early 1990s and that elders, told of it, invoked the two-witness rule and expelled her instead. Her suit, filed 20 July 2026, argues that the sexual acts she says she was coerced into were 'services' under the Trafficking Victims Protection Act and that Watchtower knowingly benefited from concealing them. A judge refused on 12 August to waive her $405 filing fee, ruling on her finances without reaching the claims themselves; the fee was paid on 19 August, so the case continues. The allegations are unproven.
· Updated September 16, 2026 · 12 min read
DoctrineConfirmed
A Governing Body update made the storage and reinfusion of a patient's own blood a matter of personal conscience — one more move in an 80-year doctrine that keeps shifting in one direction. Updated 19 September 2026: six months later the Governing Body extended the same principle to the four primary components of another person's blood; whole-blood transfusions remain prohibited.
· Updated September 19, 2026 · 6 min read
DoctrineConfirmed
A “Questions From Readers” article released on 18 September 2026 leaves the use of red cells, white cells, plasma and platelets taken from another person — and the decision to donate blood so components or fractions can be made from it — to each member's conscience, and says the congregation “will not get involved in that decision.” Transfusions of whole blood, and donating blood for one, remain prohibited. It is the second change to the blood doctrine this year.
· September 18, 2026 · 9 min read
DoctrineConfirmed
A July 15, 2011 study article urged Jehovah's Witnesses to shun former members it described, citing 1 Timothy 6:3-4, as 'mentally diseased.' The wording drew UK press coverage, a Portsmouth police complaint that produced no charge, and an Australian tribunal filing.
· July 15, 2011 · 3 min read
DoctrineConfirmed
In Governing Body Update #5, released on jw.org on August 22, 2025, David Splane addressed 'additional secular education' and, per ex-member transcriptions, presented it more as a personal choice than the spiritual risk decades of Watchtower literature had described.
· August 22, 2025 · 3 min read
MediaConfirmed
The three-part series, released March 2024 on RTL's streaming service, is built on testimony from 57 former members and covers abuse, shunning, and apocalyptic teaching.
· March 13, 2024 · 3 min read
Director Pablo Aguinaga described the survivors' testimonies as 'devastating; these were deeply broken people who had suffered greatly.'Confirmed
The three-part series Sobrevivir al Paraiso: Mas alla de los Testigos de Jehova premiered on HBO Max on 20 February 2026, tracing former Spanish members' accounts of abuse, shunning, and legal action. Reception has so far been mixed and thinly covered by major outlets.
· February 20, 2026 · 3 min read
Superseded by an August 1, 2016 letterConfirmed
A confidential October 1, 2012 letter to U.S. bodies of elders routed child-abuse allegations through Watch Tower's Legal and Service Departments, kept the two-witness rule, and let the branch decide who counts as a "predator" — while saying nothing about reporting to secular authorities.
· October 1, 2012 · 4 min read
