Commonwealth v. Barnhart: convictions affirmed after Faith Tabernacle parents relied on prayer for a child's cancer
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Material that narrows or disputes the record
Appellate history
1985-08-16
Convictions affirmed; religious-freedom defense rejected.
Record class
Core record
Evidence status
Convicted
Authority role
parents relying on church doctrine of faith healing
Organization
Faith Tabernacle Congregation
Archive classification
This is the archive's application of its published inclusion test. The cited record appears below.
The court recorded that the Faith Tabernacle parents had relied on God to the exclusion of modern medicine to cure their young son's Wilms' tumor; that doctrinal reliance was the basis on which medical care was withheld.
- Spiritual healing or treatment
- Threatened spiritual consequence
Evidence structure
Proceedings
1985-08-16 · appeal — convictions affirmed
Superior Court of Pennsylvania. The Pennsylvania Superior Court affirmed Robert and Carol Barnhart's convictions for involuntary manslaughter and endangering the welfare of a child; the parental duty to provide medical care was held not unconstitutionally vague.
Documented coercion mechanisms
- doctrinal refusal of medical care
Cited record
Sources
- appellate court appellate opinion Commonwealth v. Barnhart, 497 A.2d 616 (Pa. Super. 1985).
The Pennsylvania Superior Court opinion affirms the convictions and records that the parents relied on God to the exclusion of modern medicine.
Source provenance
Source access and integrity log
This log records source retrieval and file integrity. It does not mean that an automated process independently confirmed every statement in the source.
- Source and tier basis
- https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/2088890/commonwealth-v-barnhart/ Corpus classification: appellate-court; evidentiary role: appellate-opinion. SHA-256 e3b0c44298fc1c149afbf4c8996fb92427ae41e4649b934ca495991b7852b855
- Retrieval
- 2026-07-20 · Preserved
- Bound by Fear automated source-preservation ledger
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Related record
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