When hoax claims originate from church members, here’s how to DEescalate & validate

When somebody says something at your church and it seems to weird, off, abnormal, or a bit concerning then you need to follow up with both the individuals who MADE UP the accusations as well as the individual that they have accused.

Here’s what that looks like in real life:

When Katie Reames walked into Pathway Church’s office and says something concerning, it’s good to follow up with both sides of the story. As one member stated, “she (Katie) made it sound like you were going to walk into church guns ablazing” Obviously that is very very concerning, right?

So concerning, in fact, that one of our town’s own Burleson Police officers spent the morning in the lobby of Pathway Church fulling willing to take any and all appropriate measures should “something” happen.

Now, Pathway church has their own law enforcement officer who is supposed to be (read: should be) in charge of the church’s volunteer safety team which the Reames family is part of.

Pastor Rick Owen has chosen a neighboring city’s police Lt. Shane Wickson to ensure Pathway Church’s safety and implement policies, procedures, and put people in place which are supposed to protect the church. And, Shane Wickson (Cleburne P.D.) passed on this claim to our local police department here in Burleson. (perhaps a few crucially important details were {cough} “left out” of Wickson’s communication)

Most churches do not really want a member of their own safety squad making hoax threats & accusations. Remember making hoax threats is both a state felony & federal felony and it takes police away from legitimate calls, patrolling, and responding to real emergencies.

If you have a law enforcement officer in place at your church, then that law enforcement officer needs to follow up with every angle of a hoax threat – ALWAYS. Before acting on, or taking any steps further, remember to validate – even if it’s from a fellow law enforcement member.

It’s sad that this needs to be said, but horrifically true that it needs to be heard!

You never want to use the police department, nor take away from other church member’s safety, by having someone from WITHIN the church’s safety team making hoax threats – regardless if it is a “volunteer” or the cop in charge of the volunteers.

What everyone might think is completely inappropriate, it would appear that Pathway seems to embrace as the norm. Remember this didn’t happen once – it’s a pattern.

On one side of the accusation there is an accuser walking into the church office and making a hoax threat about someone else claiming that another individual is going to do something violent to the church with a gun.

On the other hand, I’m in the parking lot on the golf cart welcoming people into church. And, after seeing, and watching the Reames family’s ordeal on September 16th (other safety team member cell recording, my won phone’s recording, the police department’s dispatch call and both officer’s body cam recordings) I have simply chosen to keep my distance, note the shenanigans, and not say a word to them.

So, the person making the hoax threat (Katie Reames) is a part of Pathway Church’s safety team, and the other individual (hi 👋 ) hasn’t spoken a word to the Reames family in months. That’s an important detail which we’ll use later in the validating questions.

I’ll talk more about how dangerous this situation was for church goers later, but for now, lets look at how to deescalate and validate situations like this.

Always make sure that the person is not using your church’s resources to simply create attention seeking claims or vindictively trying to get back at someone. Remember, making hoax threats are both a state and federal felony.

In order to properly deescalate and validate Katie’s claim always be sure to listen carefully while asking validating questions. ….and ALWAYS VALIDATE!


These are questions to ask AS the individual is making the accusations.
Below these are more questions to ask AFTER the incident.

toggle each one question open to read the answer

Truth is finite & hoax claims can be infinite. Often times people will attempt to use hoax claims to get revenge for someone else, gain attention for themselves, or any vast number of endless reasons. Remember, your goal is to identify the validity of the accusation. Always validate before you escalate.

Always try to validate an accusation with something tangible. You are listening for tangible details which can be authenticated. A example would be “…he called me…” which would leave a verification point on the T-Mobile bill. There’s thousands of examples of validation points. But remember, your goal is to LISTEN.

In this case, Katie and I had only talked once when I reached out and asked her to encourage Ms. Conaway to grow past her traumatic delusional flashbacks about going to counselling & to reassure Ms. Conaway that going to counseling is a normal healthy thing that people do. Beyond that 15 minute conversation months earlier, we had NOT spoken since. Again, you are listening for something which can be validated. Questions that start with ‘who, what, when, where’ always have definitive tangible answers.

Your goal is to find out if those answers match up to reality.

Never try to take an approach that you’re going to “catch” or “trip up” a person. As you are asking questions, you goal is to simply listen carefully and give the individual plenty of opportunity to fill in as much of their story as possible.

This question is one that can be used to build on the one above. Always give the accuser a blank slate to fill in as many parts of their story as they would like. Ask, then listen. Even pause with more patience when you think they are done. What you’re doing here is giving yourself as much of the accuser’s story to verify and validate.

Remember almost everything on almost every social media channel has both a time and date stamp. This can always be captured by anyone via a quick screenshot and/or digital records can be subpoenaed by a judge with a quick signature should the incident turn out to be a hoax claim.

Remember though, your goal is to get to the bottom of it. When nothing is founded, nothing happens, and there is no incident

SOMEONE LIED

If you know the people in the situation, always ask direct questions. And in this scenario, you would want to simply ask, and then shut up & listen. Even go so far as to pause when the accuser is done to simply ask, “Is there anything else you’d like to tell us?” Pause, keep a level head, no expression, lean in, be curious, and just listen.

Remember, if the person is only using words to ‘create’ the hoax claim, then ask the W Questions for details there as well. Either they will be able to fill in correct details or they will have to double down and layer on more details which will not add up.

If the individual responds with something like, “everyone knows” or ” we were with some friends”, then ask for specific names. You do not necessarily need those names exactly but it could come in handy if you need to follow up with those others. The MAIN goal here is to see if the accuser will be able to come up with those other details to fill in the hoax claim.

As the accuser is making up their fake threat, you simply want to give them as many chances as possible to reinforce their story giving you more details to validate. Listen to the accuser – either the claim will have merit or it will fall apart.

Again, this is an easily verifiable question. If the person replies with something like, “…uhm yeah. no one else knows about this b/c no one else was around….” then that’s fine. Simply use the W‘s & listen to the accuser’s answer. When were you and him alone? Why was there no one else around? Where were you two located? If those details can’t be filled in, there might be a reason.

SOMEONE LIED.

There’s never “two sides to any story – he said & she said” That myth needs to go away.

There’s INFINITE sides to any lie.
But only one truth.

Hoax threats like these need to be identified, deescalated and validated in the first place. You should never want to see a pattern of these behaviors. The need to be prevented from happening in the first place.

Even if you don’t follow up and diffuse the hoax threat on the initial onset, then it still needs to be followed up on.

All threats should be followed up & taken seriously:
especially HOAX THREATS.


After the service, after Burleson Police has come out & gone, and after nothing happened, then it is even more crucial to follow up with the person who made the accusation.

You might be asking yourself, “So Brad, you didn’t have a gun and you weren’t going to come into church guns ablazing?” Of course not. It’s Katie Reames once again starting crap.

I’m out on the golf cart, getting folks into church, blaring the bluetooth speaker too loud and more than likely singing as I’m driving around welcoming folks to Pathway church! 🤣

When you’ve got a cop in charge of your church’s safety squad, that law enforcement officer’s goal should never be to embrace, cover for, and harbor people who make hoax threats.

Toxic people in the church happens all the time. When (SINCE) situations like this happen, Healthy Boundaries need to be put in place & corrective measures need to be taken. (It’s probably not a smart idea to give ’em a badge and let them be a greeter – just sayin’)

What’s bothersome and concerning here is that you never want to have people like this inciting and instigating hoax threats – for any reason – especially from INSIDE of the church’s safety team.

Instead of Shane Wickson validating anything at all from the Reame’s claim, he simply decides to run with it.

All threats should be followed up & taken seriously:
especially HOAX THREATS.

Look, people love to manipulate and capitalize from other’s fears with claims like “It’s for safety. It’s for the kids. Save the dolphins. The sky is falling.” with these types of scams, scenarios and CONs. Even if it’s someone with a badge wanting to exercise a hero complex, it is never good to enable toxic people in the church with hoax claims.

Yet that is exactly what is seen happening from within Pathway church’s safety squad.

Especially after-the-fact, once it’s validated that Katie Reame’s statement was indeed a hoax threat, there is still a lack of any corrective action from within the church’s safety team.

Even if one is to take the mindset of, “It’s for the women and the children and the orphans and the soldier who are in imminent danger of becoming extinct due to the liberal media taking our guns and instigating fear mongering claims….(you get the point) ……then afterwards, follow up still needs to happen once the situation has established itself and nothing happened.

Fear mongering has been going on for years. It’s the oldest sales trick: Make a hole and sell someone the shovel.
It’s a shame that some will take advantage of public trust, good will, and manipulate others trust by embellishing a lie, but this is what happens.

Remember almost every church is going to have a handful of people like this. Here’s some example questions that you can follow up with AFTER THE FACT. These are for BOTH your own church’s “Katie” claims AND for the head of the safety squad as well:

What you’re wanting to listen for here is for the organization or individual to be truthful. Remember, public records requests only take a few clicks. So, you can easily jump online and make a request for all police incidents.

The other element that you want to listen for is if the individual or organization will voluntarily use fear mongering tactics to even go so far as to brag about other incidents where they have utilized public resources for some antics or stunts.

A person answering this deceptively might say things like, “This is the first time it’s happened” or even something similar to “This was a one time event” , “We don’t actively ask emergency responders to come out for these hoax threats”

I’ll let other individuals come forward with their story if they wish. However, what your listening for here from Pathway Church’s safety squad members to answer – either truthfully or deceptively.

Remember, everyone hates being caught in a lie. Using social fear to redirect an answer is a commonplace tactic.

Never enable a liar.

What your listening for here in this answer is to see how many years this behavior has been going on. In most instances, you’ll find that this is NOT something that is “church wide”. More often than not, it’s simply a handful of individuals. Unfortunately, one of the individuals might be a cop, a spouse team on the church’s safety squad, and a few others.

Remember, your looking for a pattern of behavior. Most con artist and fraud jobs usually involve more than one person. From catholic churches who abuse little boys to your local mainstream church making up hoax claims, these instances usually involve more than one person and have an established history.

This might not be a question that the person will answer directly. But ask it anyway and listen very intently. Here’s what you’re wanting to listen for: Remember those other individuals I mentioned above? Will the person making the accusations willingly admit to doing this multiple times?

Many times, you can very easily leverage the pride of the person making the accusations to help them open up to revealing more instances. They are so proud of “putting out a fire that didn’t exist” that they are more than willing to tell you more stories having the same pattern.

Remember though, LISTEN. Listen to what they are claiming.

That image from the above question happened months AFTER Katie has already made several hoax claims. In other words, it should have NEVER happened in the first place.

Often times, you will find a PATTERN of a person’s deceptive behaviors.

This is something you would want to ask to anyone on the organization or church. From the pastor, deacon, bishop, safety team member, executive leadership, anyone on staff, or however the organization is laid out – ask this question and then patiently and calmly wait for their reply.

People who are concerned with safety – not perception – but actual real safety will reply with some level of corrective actions that were taken to the individual(s) creating these hoax threats.

If the organization or individual is more concerned with perception, then this question will be dodgy to answer with

Again, you’re listening for the cop (Shane ninjacop Wickson) to back up the claim which he has now regurgitated to our own Burleson Police which Katie Reames has made.

Wait for the cop to bury himself in his own lies. Or, you can make a public information request and see his emails. 😉

Point being, when you’re dealing with a questionable cop whose incompetence is backed up with actions, words, and time/date stamped electronic communication, then you’ll have a better understanding.

Even after this Sunday has come and gone, the cop in charge of Pathway Church’s safety hasn’t even spoken a word to me in follow up (which is fine), however he sure does seem to have a really big ear for exponentially growing other people’s drama.

Even to the point of putting other officers and the church’s congregation in danger.

The mistakes that could have happened that Sunday morning are horrific. Simply reaching in my bag to get another battery pack for the bluetooth speaker could have resulted in catastrophic situations.

At any point in questioning, a cop is going to do one of two things. Either they respect the integrity of their badge, or they simply want to cover their incompetence.

An incompetent cop is going to say, “Hey. I’ve never said a word to him!” A proper law enforcement officer who cares about the safety of the church and everyone inside would respond with something more appropriate like, “Hey Brad. I’m not sure why, but those recordings of Katie’s lies on Sept. 16th were only the start of it. Now she’s expecting me to take action on fake threats about you. Here’s what happened…….

The problem when you question a firefighter arsonist or a tin-foil hat wearing cop is that you always want to give them very cautious leeway. Let them dig themselves into their lie, while pulling public records.

If the cop’s actions & words show a pattern of misconduct, it’s time to have some higher authorities get involved.

Again, always be calm when asking someone about their fake threats. They will probably know that they are busted & in an attempt to dodge any accountability, the individual will probably make up more claims – which is what Katie does.

More than likely, people like this will have a pattern of instigating Burleson Police. And, again you can always pull public record to get a better understanding of Katie Reames (and others) claims.

………..that’s just F*cking sick. What kind of a sicko even says that? Oh wait, what kind of sicko LAUGHS?!?! Katie!

There’s a suicide every 40 seconds. 22 Veterans die from suicide everyday. And, these idiots think it’s funny to make fake threats about ANYTHING! BTW: just for clarification, I’m ok w/ my brains being on the INside 👍

For those who are local, yep that’s the Rames-mobile. Nice parking job BPD 😉

So, if you’ll listen carefully and get a full picture of people who make fake threats, most often times, you will indeed find a pattern.

Most suburbs have various law enforcement officers living within their community. When someone with a badge brings a “concern” to another officer, there needs to be ZERO concern that the church’s safety officer is lying.

You need to trust that the officer is not lying. Unfortunately, that’s not the case here. Lt. Shane Wickson consistently demonstrates his incompetence by repeatedly feeding his own ego from Katie Reames outlandish, unchecked, and grotesquely false claims.

Since this is an escalating pattern with both a history of these claims, and since there has been apparently no corrective action taken, these fake threats continue to snowball in their intensity and deceptive nature.

Be careful that Katie Reames (and others like her) does not forcibly instigate her will onto your church and law enforcement agency. As we’ll see, these fake threats continue to grow to egregious degrees and more law enforcement officers are called out over and over again.

The main takeaway from this question is to always take a few seconds, even take 3 minutes to verify before you amplify someone’s claim. Unfortunately, this applies to some -not all- law enforcement officers as well.

When confronted with a direct question like this, you’ll find the person’s response to usually be void of any real accountability.

On one hand they know that they’ve lied. On the other hand, they’ll think that they are totally self-righteous and dignified in their claims.

In either scenario when you ask a question like this, listen very intently, very purposefully, and very carefully. This is an open ended question type.

Once you’ve got a verified history that the person is making up fake threats, listen carefully to their answer to this question. If asked in an electronic medium like a chat, text or email, take note of their response and read it, then re-read it, read it again, and re-read it again. Asked audibly, you’ll want to write down the reply.

What you’ll discover from an open ended question like this is a glimpse into the ‘why’ behind the lie.

This would be a question for your head of church safety (or Shane Wickson at Pathway) & here’s what you’re wanting to find out:

Why has Pastor Rick Owen put such an incompetent officer in charge? Since we can establish a verifiable pattern of misconduct by combining both my transparency and (more importantly) public record requests, why would Shane Wickson not have cleared this bogus claim from Katie Reames prior to putting in a call to local Burleson Police department who were fully anticipating having to react with “appropriate measures”?

Why do that?

What you’ll discover is that sometimes officers like to project the image of safety to the congregation, and use that ‘work’ to promote their career in rank advancement. The tragic reality here is that Shane Wickson’s incompetence to tell Katie to STOP is only surpassed by his desire to fuel future claims which he will again, never validate as being a real threat or a made up hoax.

Again, what you want to do here is to pull public records before asking this question.

If you’re local here in Burleson, here’s the link:
https://www.burlesontx.com/FormCenter/Miscellaneous-Forms-5/Open-Records-Request-123

Katie Reames walks into church and makes up a threat that doesn’t exist. Before you inquire how many years this has been going on, make a simple public records request online. It doesn’t take but a few minutes to get all of Shane Wickson’s emails and/or text messages and/or any other information regarding how many times Burleson Police have been dispatched out to handle what amounts to “drama queens & hero complex”.

Grab a copy of all those, bounce it around to a few other officers, take ’em out to lunch or ask for a sit down meeting at the P.D.’s office. Find out how many times this has happened and you’ll quickly see the pattern.

The safety squad magically appears to put out the fire that never existed in the first place.

And, I want to use this so that others locally and around the world to learn, grow and gain wisdom from this. Please share.

https://www.facebook.com/friendship/bradkgriffin/faith.g.conaway

How many HOAX THREATS against a church does it take

Fake Threats against a church

(a) A person commits an offense if he knowingly initiates, communicates or circulates a report of a present, past, or future bombing, fire, offense, or other emergency that he knows is false or baseless and that would ordinarily:

(1) cause action by an official or volunteer agency organized to deal with emergencies;
(2) place a person in fear of imminent serious bodily injury;  or
(3) prevent or interrupt the occupation of a building, room, place of assembly, place to which the public has access, or aircraft, automobile, or other mode of conveyance.
(b) An offense under this section is a Class A misdemeanor unless the false report is of an emergency involving a public or private institution of higher education or involving a public primary or secondary school, public communications, public transportation, public water, gas, or power supply or other public service, in which event the offense is a state jail felony.


TEXAS PENAL CODE – PENAL § 42.06. FALSE ALARM OR REPORT

After having talked with several litigation firms, one of them did point out how repugnant and egregious Pathway Church’s actions were. And, it was explained a bit like this:

Walk up to any of the Safety Team members and simply, politely, gently ask them some questions that will help them identify what went wrong in this scenario.

In February of 2018, while I was walking from inside to outside getting into the golf cart, a gentlemen from Pathway’s Scuba Steve Safety Squad was following me around. I noticed that he was looking under the air conditioning units that are between the two sets of double doors that are on the southeast side of the church.

Now, in almost 2 decades of going to Pathway, I have heard doors that shut louder than others, lights that flicker consistently, the men’s bathroom gets clogged if the pump over at the corner of the property is having problems, the push cart that holds the tables has a busted wheel, but…….

Never in ~2 decades of going to Pathway Church, have I ever seen someone running around behind someone else looking around anything & everything that a person walks near or touches looking for “something” that the individual may have “planted”.

So, here’s where we take careful note in how we interview a person.

  • Remember that the Pathway’s Scuba Steve Safety Squad is full of volunteers and that it is also led by a law enforcement officer – Shane Wickson.
  • There is also a behavioral pattern of these folks seemingly feeding off of hoax claims. One person starts a rumor, and another gets to ‘feel good’ about taking action to cover the initial lie.
  • Never take for granted a good-ole-boy’s inability to contain his ‘excitement’ factor when he gets to play with his ‘macho-ism’.

Keeping those factors in mind, and with complete objectivity, self control, and level headed approach, here’s the interview questions.


Hey, has there ever been a time when you were at Pathway Church and you had to go look for something that someone might have planted? And, were you outside following this person around looking around where he walked and near the AC units?

Oh absolutely! There was this one time in February of 2018 that I was ___________

…..told that someone’s EX might have planted something? Yeah. That’s what happens when one person –who can’t get past the delusional fears in her head– associates something / anything on the news, to her own reality. The Amazon Package hooplah was in the news. But it’s your job, if you really want to help, to validate the reality and DEescalate the fears that don’t exist. Your not helping someone if you give a drunk a drink, right? In the same way, if you feed the demons from someone’s past, they will grow as well.

Remember our goal here: Whether it’s listening to someone with paranoid delusions or they are on the ragtag volunteer safety squad, is to let the other person come out with the information in a way that doesn’t cause confrontation and that plays off of their personality. Fast acting, pride, big brother, machoism, and hero complex all come into the factor here when listening to this person recall the incidents and events related to this situation.

So, someone had notified the church’s safety team that another individual might have planted a b_mb or something similar somewhere?

Definitely! But, don’t worry. I made sure he didn’t get away with anything. We take all threats seriously.


So, wait. There actually WAS a threat made? Well, sure! It was NOT from me, but it was about me. Someone made a hoax threat. Period. It is what it is. It happened, let’s move forward.

Instead of telling that person, “Knowingly making a false report is something we take seriously. You need to stop lying. It’s not funny. It’s not a joke. It IS a crime on both the state and federal level. Ma’am, if you’d like to go start drama, violate the court issued restraining order, and do this junk on your own – that’s one thing. But here at Church, making false claims is not something we take lightly. You need to stop.”

But, of course that didn’t happen. And, this gentlemen goes on, next month to pull an even bigger stunt.

But let’s zoom back out a minute.
A PERSON COMMITS AN OFFENSE IF (s)HE KNOWINGLY INITIATES, COMMUNICATES OR CIRCULATES A REPORT OF A PRESENT, PAST, OR FUTURE BOMBING, FIRE, OFFENSE, OR OTHER EMERGENCY THAT HE KNOWS IS FALSE OR BASELESS


Just so we’re crystal clear: Making False Claims is not ok. Making False Claims to the Burleson Police is not appropriate. And, should there be any question, I definitely prefer my brains to be on the insides of my head.

So, we’ve got Fake Threats from Ms. Conaway and accompanying vigilantes from Pathway Church’s Scuba Steve Safety Squad in September.


Then in October, we’ve got death threats which are proudly and publicly displayed from both Ms. Conaway’s friends who are from the extremist religious group conveniently combined with lovely affirmations from Pathway Church’s Scuba Steve Safety Squad member Ms. Katie Reames here locally.

Was this public? Absolutely! And, there’s no kind of internal filter from Ms. Conaway which says,
“Hmmm…. perhaps I should delete their comments”? Nope.


Faith Conaway Restraining Order
Faith Conaway Restraining Order

And, after watching the rest of the fake accusations from the Burleson Police Videos listening to, “He’s married.” & “If I tell you he touched me inappropriately, will you arrest him?” and more from the Sept. 16th episode, that led to this restraining order being issued to Ms. Conaway in October.


Of course then in December, we’ve got this accusation. Of course the smart savvy soccer moms & dads asked good questions like, “Wow. How long has this been going on?” Her reply, “Since September“. And, “How often has this happened?” Her reply, “Oh it’s happened 4 times!

So……….. Let’s make sure we’ve got this straight. That’s 12 Sundays, right? And, Alexis has been “terrorized” 4 of those Sundays? So, welcome to Pathway Church everyone. Your kiddo can be terrorized every three Sundays. Just like Ms. Conaway’s kiddo!

……….wait, what? That’s not true.

That’s what happens when you feed the abusive demons from a person’s past. They get bigger and bigger and grow to out-of-control claims that make the church look bad. You don’t feed the abuse. That does NOT help the person – at all.

Yeah, um, no. Just no.
That neither ads up, nor makes any sense.

From the thousands of people who saw this post, I want to THANK the 3 that actually followed up correctly with the right interview questions validating the legitimacy of these claims. THANK YOU!

Always listen to the accusation correctly – with no confirmation bias, no gender blinders, no tin-foil hats, ask clarifying questions, and DO have absolute concern for the person making the claim.


So, now in February 2018, there’s a b_mb threat?

Let’s remember the opening statute again: A PERSON COMMITS AN OFFENSE IF (s)HE KNOWINGLY INITIATES, COMMUNICATES OR CIRCULATES A REPORT OF A PRESENT, PAST, OR FUTURE BOMBING, FIRE, OFFENSE, OR OTHER EMERGENCY THAT
(s) HE KNOWS IS FALSE OR BASELESS

That’s not a “oh, i was doing 5 miles over the speed limit” type of offense. It’s not a “whoops. i rolled through the stop sign” type of offense. The state set classification is simply a Class A Misdemeanor, but when it’s at a place of worship with a school does that make it a felony?

Wait. Does that even matter what the classification is? No! Of course not.

Who in their right mind, says that they are concerned with “Church Safety” yet does nothing once they realize it was a hoax threat? And these folks are led by a cop?

Why is there a “special few” who keep getting away with these fake threats? And, why is there a consistent LACK of any corrective action taken on the part of Pathway’s Safety Team? Even if it is a “special” or “favored” individual (i’m trying to dance around the gender issue here, but i think i’m doing a horrible job at it 😉, why not –at the very minimum– give that individual & friends a huge stern warning against making hoax threats?

When a fake threat happens ONE TIME, that’s a mistake. When a guy gives his significant other forgiveness freely fast and frequently, that’s great. But to continually have Pathway Church enable this toxic behavior is utterly egregious.

When a FAKE threat happens in September, and again in November, again in December, again in February, and again in March, that’s a PATTERN.

Allowing that pattern to continue to cycle over and over and over again with the same person (or two) consistently making HOAX threats is nothing short of DANGEROUS.

Enabling a Toxic Behavior tells the other person that it’s tolerated, that it’s totally ok to make those false threats. And, of course, they’ll continually do it.

When a person gets you to react once, they know that you’ll react to it again (and again and again), and that’s not good.

Your goal in diffusing and deescalating is to stay calm, validate the truth, and filter out the false.

Fake threats shouldn’t be enabled for one person to simply instigate hatred for another person. Hoax threats against a church is not something to throw around about a spouse simply because the lady didn’t get her way, and fake threats are not to be used to gain attention from one or two people.

I still marvel at what Pathway Church has done & the fact that they have no desire to make a public statement of correction. But why should they? They did it again in March!

I get that you wanted to be the hero, stroke the ego, and play off the damsel in distress. But sometimes, when people like Patrick and Kevin (from the “Safety Team”) don’t listen when I ask them to DEescalate her claims so that she’s not found violating the court ordered restraining order, then you wind up doing the person more harm than good. Go play Scuba Steve Safety Squad at Pathway. Validate the curiosity. But do NOT ever ignore the person actually making the false threats.

When I brought Faith to Pathway Church, I trusted you folks to help – not hurt.

It doesn’t matter if it’s a man, a woman, a lesbian trapped in a hermaphrodites body, if they are married, single, or dating, taking hormone replacement meds who identifies as a bisexual triceratops riding a unicycle, or what their story is.

Always reach out to the person who ACTUALLY made the false claim in the first place. They might need your help. They do NOT need your toxic enabling! The person making the HOAX threat (about someone else) is wanting your attention.

Do not feed the demons from their abusive past. Give them a healthy opportunity to find authentic healing.

BETTER QUESTIONS:

Hey, thanks for your concern. Can you tell us why you’re making this claim?

Some people suffer from their past hurts. And, even after their previous situation is gone, they still harbor and hold on to their old beliefs. When an individual does not heal from abuse, they can then go on to abuse others. People make false claims for various reasons. As soon as a violent threat is identified as fake, then the drama needs to stop and your safety team needs to resolve what is going on with the person.

Always follow up with the person being accused.

Don’t ever think that you can’t walk up to someone and ask simple, social, friendly questions like: Hey, how’s it going? How are things at home? How’s your personal life? Often times initiating that dialogue will elicit better informed and educated assessments of the person making the false claims. The reply in this situation would be something like, “It’s been better. But I’m ok. I’ve been trying to find post-abuse specific counseling because I’m worried that her past is creeping back up to haunt her. Just last week she still thinks that her first EX is going to kidnap Aubree, Alexis, and Katelyn. Know any good therapists?”

For the Person making the false threats, have Boundaries with Love

The person making the false threats to the church might be simply attempting to instigate attention or trying to discredit another person. That’s typical in suburbia-ville where everyone knows everyone. However, you never want to validate, escalate, and amplify that person’s claims as soon as they are determined to be invalid. It’s ok to love them & at the same time, it is healthy to not allow them a position of representing the church in a greeter, coordinator, or the point-of-contact for anything ‘church related’.
Until and unless the original situation is resolved with acknowledgement, understanding, and a commitment to not make any further false claims, then it is ok if the person maintains a healthy yet loving separation for a while.

Time heals all of nothing. It’s a choice.

If the person is willing to chose to heal from the false accusation, great. IF, for any reason, they continue the cycle of creating fake stories and using someone else’s name in those hoax threats against the church, then you know that reconciliation & healthy relationships should not be entered into quite yet. Remember that you control yourself only. IF the other person does not choose to heal, then love them, say hi in the lobby, and keep your church safe.

Never let a LIE CONTROL your church

If the person simply refuses any self guided correction and refuses any church initiated suggestions, then it’s time to say something like: Your abusive fear mongering will NOT dictate the actions of this church, it’s safety team, will not steal from community resources, and we will not take part in a lie. If you can not stop (especially after the 1st, 2nd, or subsequent event), then we need to take better steps to get you the help you need.


Your House of Worship is a place to be PROTECTED.
not used as the local drama club

One of the best phrases for someone making false and outlandish accusations is:

Listen to what you’re saying.

False Threats are not a Joke. They are a FEDERAL crime.

It’s not okay to make a false report to a Jewish community in San Francisco.

It’s not ok to make a false bomb threat to a place of employment out of resentment.

It’s not a joke to make false threats to a school in Colorado.

it’s not okay to make a false report to anywhere – ever.

there’s not some type of magical waiver that says, “if you have a specific set of genitals and a minivan then tolerating fake accusations becomes okay”.

If you go over to Shane (Pathway Church’s Head of “Security”) and say, “Am I sitting next to someone who makes hopes threats against the church?” the real answer is yes.

Although that answer might not really sit well with the community, it’s still a reality.

If you ask any of the safety squad members, “Has Brad ever said, done, implied, anything at all –ever– about causing any harm?” The answer is No.

Now if you go ask Casey or Patrick or Kevin and ask them where are these accusations continually originated from, they don’t really want to say oh it kept coming from a couple of individuals.

……….and those Hoax Threats were consistently unfounded.

Those fake claims are not a joke, not taken seriously & are not followed up on. Because that would mean that they have to face the reality that Brad’s out there on the golf cart picking up people for church and these fake rumors keep coming from a certain circle of friends within the church.

At no point is it ok to layer on a “false sense of security” and claim that it’s for the kids, its for the women and the children and the widows and the orphans and it’s for the safety of the church…. When in reality, it’s simply a couple of people making vindictive false accusations.

It really does put the church in a dichotomy of a situation where they have to say, “Okay wait a minute if I tell the truth that doesn’t look good.”

The church could say, “Yes. These fake threats are from Katy, Faith or Adrian and we continually feed off of those hoax threats.” But that doesn’t leave the boys to stroke their hero complex with any great stories.

These fake claims are never actually followed up correctly. Instead the safety Squad continually feeds off of these fake claims from these people, and seemingly has no boundaries to tell them to stop making these hoax claims against the church.

Instead what happens consistently, is that the safety Squad repeatedly embellishes these fake threats and lavishes in the thought that, ” we are protecting the safety of the church”.

In reality they’re doing nothing more then protecting the image of a couple of people by not reporting these individuals for making false threats against the church, and instead twisting……… what’s the right way to say that…. twisting those false reports into an event where they make themselves look good and stroke their own macho-ism.

It’s very similar to a mom who continually makes her kid sick so that she can gain social sympathy.


https://abcnews.go.com/Health/munchausen-proxy/story?id=52123783

And it’s very parallel to the firefighter who goes around starting fires so that he can be seen as the ‘Hero’ who comes along to put them out.

https://www.fox10phoenix.com/news/arizona-news/phoenix-firefighter-arrested-by-phoenix-police

And the tragic reality here is that if they would simply stop lavishing in someone else’s lie then these events wouldn’t happen. If they would grow up and take a false threat against a religious organization seriously, things will turn out differently.

It would, though, mean that the safety Squad wouldn’t have self gloating events to pat themselves on the back with, and it would mean that the safety Squad would have to be transparent and accountable in revealing where those accusations continually come from.

Making a false threat is a crime. a federal crime. It’s not a joke. It’s not funny. A false accusation against a religious organization involving a bomb, guns, children, or anything else is not a joke.

https://www.fbi.gov/news/stories/hoax-threats-awareness-100518

Every false accusations should be taken seriously. Subsequently any person who made the false report should be follow up with appropriate course of action as well.

You don’t make a false accusation to get back at someone. You don’t make up a fake threat against the church just out of vindictiveness. You don’t tell the safety team that someone is going to walk into church guns a-blazing unless that person actually said it.

If you are sitting in church and you can look to your left or your right and see someone who has made a false threat against the church, still sitting there, then there IS A PROBLEM.

How many times should a person be allowed to make fake threats before someone does something to deal with the actual person making those false threats?


18 U.S. Code § 844 (e) Whoever, through the use of the mail, telephone, telegraph, or other instrument of interstate or foreign commerce, or in or affecting interstate or foreign commerce, willfully makes any threat, or maliciously conveys false information knowing the same to be false, concerning an attempt or alleged attempt being made, or to be made, to kill, injure, or intimidate any individual or unlawfully to damage or destroy any building, vehicle, or other real or personal property by means of fire or an explosive shall be imprisoned for not more than 10 years or fined under this title, or both.


18 U.S. Code § 844 (e)

https://apnews.com/e62c1e94c41b4e9f9aec7780efad288c

https://www.foxnews.com/us/jussie-smolletts-alleged-hate-crime-hoax-sheds-light-on-similar-phony-accusations

Watch this story:

https://www.foxnews.com/us/jussie-smolletts-alleged-hate-crime-hoax-sheds-light-on-similar-phony-accusations

For the two times that Burleson P.D. was called out to Pathway Church because of those hoax claims, can you imagine what the reaction would be? Obviously Burleson isn’t as large as Chicago. And that kinda makes it more important. Because this is a community, then I can’t imagine people reacting in a way that says, “Oh. Hey, they like to file false reports? Meh….. we’re totally cool with that. Have fun!”

That wouldn’t be the reaction at all, would it?

Zero Tolerance

If there is something about you, your church, your non profit, or your organization that simply can NOT put the needs of others above the appearance of your own perception, then you need to quit.

If there is something about your church which dictates that the perception of a few dictates taking away from the safety of all, then you need to turn in your pulpit and walk away.

If there is something crooked about being a law enforcement officer that demonstrates a persistent pattern of deception and lies to the public and to other officers – consistently! – then do everyone a favor and turn in your badge. Do the other officers a favor and don’t make them look bad. Do your city a favor and don’t make people wonder if they are corrupt. Do the public citizens a favor and don’t put them in danger. A sick and twisted desire to attempt to make yourself look good over verifying, identifying, and validating the safety, legality, and protection of everyone is stupid. It makes all officers look bad.
Just as similar as one false report gives room for people to question other claims and accusations – so does one crooked lying cop give room for other people to question the legitimacy of other HONEST Police Officers.
If you’ve got something going on that yields public records request of communication showing nothing but one coerced lie after another – then turn in your badge and walk away. Do yourself and your community a favor – quit.

When you find something decieptful about a pastor, and they simply refuse to stop and acknowledge that their people and actions are possibly illegal, wrong, socially irresponsible and wrong, do your congregation and your community a favor and simply walk away.
If your ability to “rightly divide the truth” and “protect the sheep from the wolves” is somehow twisted, perverted, and warped into some sick so bad that you can have your own words and actions shown to be corrupted, then do everyone else a favor and quit.

If you’re not willing to be part of the solution, then at the very minimum, stop being a part of the problem.

There should be ZERO TOLERANCE for corruption, lies, fraud, cons, and deceptive actions. Not in a law enforcement role, and never should it be tolerated in a church.

Never devote yourself to covering one lie with another lie.

If your leadership is devoted to covering one lie with another lie, there is a problem

Church safety is not a joke.

Abusing first responders to cover up one story with an even bigger whopper is a crime on several levels.

They are pursuing a desire. Continually, repeatedly pursuing a desire to have the “appearance” rather than the “reality”.

Becoming committed and devoted to covering one lie with another lie w/ another lie….. It becomes your IDENTITY.

When identity becomes the devotion, the obsession, the consistent normal, then there is a problem. Is there a desire to be consistent with church safety and rightly dividing the truth? Or is there an obsession with maintaining the appearance and the identity of covering one lie with another story from another ill-thought-out lie that came from another lie piled on….?

When that obsessive, relentless, ruthless & unending obsession becomes a pattern, the norm, and encouraged, then there is a serious problem with the church. For both a church safety, leadership, and pastoral level, serious questions need to be raised.

It’s not a matter of someone saying, “Hey. So and so is accusing you folks of doing xyz.” Once the truth becomes complacent, then it unfolds into, “This has already happened. Why did you do it? And, why is there apparently no desire to stop?”

If your church is “caught like a leaf in the wind” (to quote Wayne Watson) & you find yourself consistently running around being blown around from one story, blown around to another lie, then flopping around like “a leaf in the wind” mixed up in another story, blown around by the obsession of appearance to cover up another whopper of a tale with a lie…………..

Stop.

Never devote yourself to someone else’s lie.

Is this guy fit to wear a uniform?

Shane’s actions:

NinjaCop’s Emails (some of his communication)

Lie to fellow law enforcement

What happens when one cop lies to another cop?

More importantly, WHY would one cop like to another cop?

Repeatedly?

We may never get one singular reason for Shane Wickson’s consecutive and repeated lies over and over and over again, but…. here’s some better questions to ask Pathway’s appointed Safety Team Leader:

What other subjects is he willing to lie about?

Who else is he willing to lie for?

What other justifications can motivate him to lie?

At what level of motivation is he willing to tell the truth?

What are his trigger points that instigate Shane Wickson to lie?

Is there any motivation that makes Shane want to tell the truth?

Is Shane capable of admitting a lie?

Does Shane Wickson think that he’s helping anyone by lying?

Is Shane Wickson under some level of delusional misconception that a lawyer can defend Shane from Shane’s own words?

How long has Shane Wickson been a representative in charge of the Safety of Pathway?

If ~SINCE~ Shane Wickson has been trusted with leading the Safety Team at Pathway church, how many years have these deceptive behaviors continued?

How many other people have been threatened via Shane Wickson’s repetitious baseless claims?

How many other incidents has Shane Wickson attempted to cover?

Has Shane Wickson been truthful with the law firm?


Similar to Ms. Conaway’s lawyers inability to ethically represent her any longer after Pathway’s involvement, if the law firm walks into court with deceptive, baseless, blatant lies from Shane Wickson as well, will the law firm drop Pathway as clients additionally?

Kevin Isaacs at Pathway Church Safety Team

Kevin Isaacs at Pathway Church's Safety Team knows fully well that our mother, Jan Griffin, has passed away *YEARS* ago. Yet, when Faith Conaway walks up to him and introduces Suzanne Truax as "mother", Kevin Isaacs simply decides - what?: "Screw the truth. Let's just run with some more lies and cover up reality" .....really?Kevin Isaacs at Pathway Church's Safety Team knows fully well that our mother, Jan Griffin, has passed away *YEARS* ago. Yet, when Faith Conaway walks up to him and introduces Suzanne Truax as "mother", Kevin Isaacs simply decides - what?: "Screw the truth. Let's just run with some more lies and cover up reality" .....really?
 
Wow. So, the lawyers are putting things together for court and…. Kevin Isaacs, you really do know who our mother was didn’t you? I was hoping that these lawyers weren’t making a ‘corrupt character’ connection as they’ve spent months putting pieces together and pulling up public records. But… holy crapballs dude :-O
 
(on top of all the other shenanigans…) Remember when Faith walked up to you with Suzanne Truax & attempted to introduce her as “mother”? On top of the police recordings, even after Faith Conaway is ignoring her court ordered restraining order (to stop instigating this exact sh!t right here), as people listening to the police dispatch recordings, folks looking at my own recordings (yeah for smartphones!), and watching Casey’s claims to BPD….
 
Kevin Isaacs really does (did) simply make a blatant choice *-AGAIN!-* to simply repeat Faith Conaway’s claims (key part here:) fully knowing that our mother is dead!
 
This whole notion of “Brad, they’re just trying to cover their ass” really does start to come full circle.  No matter how much I want(ed) to think, “No way. Surely this can’t be true” – The honest reality here is that Kevin Isaacs was in fact fully aware that Jan Griffin has passed away.
So, once again, the community is left with …..why?
Why is this yet another individual fully immersed in the Pathway of Deception?

Kevin Isaacs at Pathway Church's Safety Team knows fully well that our mother, Jan Griffin, has passed away *YEARS* ago. Yet, when Faith Conaway walks up to him and introduces Suzanne Truax as "mother", Kevin Isaacs simply decides - what?: "Screw the truth. Let's just run with some more lies and cover up reality" .....really?Kevin Isaacs at Pathway Church's Safety Team knows fully well that our mother, Jan Griffin, has passed away *YEARS* ago. Yet, when Faith Conaway walks up to him and introduces Suzanne Truax as "mother", Kevin Isaacs simply decides - what?: "Screw the truth. Let's just run with some more lies and cover up reality" .....really?
Kevin Isaacs at Pathway Church’s Safety Team knows fully well that our mother, Jan Griffin, has passed away *YEARS* ago. Yet, when Faith Conaway walks up to him and introduces Suzanne Truax as “mother”, Kevin Isaacs simply decides – what?: “Screw the truth. Let’s just run with some more lies and cover up reality” …..really?

……..and……. just so we’re clear: I did make an attempt to initiate conversation with Pathway Church Safety Squad long before the March 2017 charades.

Pastor vs. Personality

Where did being a pastor go so wrong?

Isn’t a pastor supposed to stand up for the truth?  When did it become about a personality contest of being liked or being ‘politically correct’ or making sure that one person or another person, or one gender issue or another situation becomes what defines the pulpit as “acceptable”?

A Pastor is supposed to stand up for the truth and protect their ‘flock’ from dangerous lies, evil wolves, and deceptive situations.

It seems like it’s turned into a ‘cult of personalities’ where… instead of clearly defining truth & lie, it’s become more of a wishy washy level of “what’s popular at the moment”.

I look back on situations and think about how pastor(s) would have handled situations differently if they would go back to ‘rightly dividing the truth’ instead of simply wanting to stick with their own cognitive bias, or stick with their circle of friends, or keep up the current status quo.

Here’s the article that I was reading:

https://somepastorsandteachers.com/2018/09/personality-driven-ministry/