Kirton McConkie attorney; Church crisis counsel
Randy Austin
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Sexual Abuse and the Institutional Response
Kirton McConkie attorney; Church crisis counsel
Austin is the Church's lead outside controversy-and-crisis counsel and the most detailed public defender of the help line. At the 2025 FAIR conference in Lehi he described it as serving 31,000 bishops and branch presidents, argued that "far more abuse gets reported when the bishop calls the helpline than if we didn't have one," and said that clergy privilege, which he counted as law in 37 states, increases rather than suppresses disclosure. He also stated publicly that he is himself a survivor of child sexual abuse.
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The Church's counsel defends the help line in public
At the FAIR conference in Lehi, Utah, Kirton McConkie attorney Randy Austin and Latter-day Saint Family Services clinical social worker Kerri Nielsen described the help line as providing 24-hour legal and counselling advice to 31,000 bishops and branch presidents worldwide. Austin said: "Far more abuse gets reported when the bishop calls the helpline than if we didn't have one," and "A child's safety always comes first. We never, ever, ever, ever leave a child in harm's way, ever." He said he had done the work for thirty years and was himself a survivor of child sexual abuse. He cited 37 U.S. states with a clergy exception and argued that studies show protecting the privilege yields more reported abuse, not less.
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