What needs to change in Idaho.

• Clergy carveout codified in § 16-1605(3)

  Idaho Code § 16-1605(3) disapplies the reporting duty to a duly ordained minister of religion for a confession or confidential communication made in his ecclesiastical capacity when three conditions hold: the church is a 501(c)(3) organization, the communication was made directly to the minister, and the church treats the communication as inviolate by canon law or church doctrine. Even though § 16-1605(1) is an all-person reporting mandate, clergy hearing confessions are statutorily excused.

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• Privilege preserved: § 9-203(3) is not abrogated for child-abuse cases

  Idaho Code § 9-203 abrogates the spousal privilege for cases of physical injury to a minor child caused by parental abuse or neglect, and removes several professional privileges for child-abuse evidentiary purposes, but contains no parallel abrogation of the clergy-penitent privilege in subsection (3). The privilege therefore remains fully available to block testimony about clergy communications even where child abuse is at issue.

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• Reform-gap pattern: amendments that never touch the clergy privilege

  An Associated Press review covering roughly the past decade found that Idaho enacted three amendments to its mandatory-reporting rules without any of them seeking to eliminate the clergy-penitent privilege. The most recent on-point legislative action, in 2018, codified the current three-prong clergy exemption rather than narrowing it.

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• Enforcement gap: the 2013 Boise case

  In 2013, a retired Boise police officer confessed to molesting infants and toddlers to as many as 15 members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, none of whom reported him. Prosecutors declined to charge any of the church members under § 16-1605 because of Idaho's clergy-penitent privilege. He was charged only after a fellow church member, who was also a police officer, learned of the confession and persuaded him to turn himself in. The leading documented Idaho example of the carveout in practice.

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What it takes to close the gap.

How Idaho got here.

• 1976
  Idaho's child-abuse reporting statute enacted

  The reporting duty was first added in 1976; it was later redesignated into the current § 16-1605 numbering in 2005.

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• 2018
  Clergy exemption codified in current form

  The 2018 amendment (Idaho Session Laws ch. 287) set the current three-prong clergy carveout in § 16-1605: 501(c)(3) status, direct communication to an ordained minister, and an inviolate-confidentiality context. The amendment locked in the exemption rather than narrowing it.

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Public-record sources UCO is tracking.

Always verify against the underlying statute or filing before quoting.

• Idaho State Legislature· current text 2026
  Idaho Code § 16-1605 — Reporting of abuse, abandonment or neglect

  Canonical statutory text. Subsection (1) imposes the duty on enumerated professionals 'or other person' (the all-person catch-all); subsection (3) carves out the clergy confession exception; subsection (4) makes failure to report a misdemeanor.

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• Idaho State Legislature· current text 2026
  Idaho Code § 9-203 — Confidential relations and communications

  Idaho's testimonial-privilege statute. Subsection (3) recognizes the clergy-penitent privilege and is not abrogated for child-abuse matters, confirming the privilege-preserved posture.

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• U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Children's Bureau / Child Welfare Information Gateway· 2023
  Clergy as Mandatory Reporters of Child Abuse and Neglect (State Statutes Current Through May 2023)

  Federal HHS classification placing Idaho among the 'any person' reporting states that preserve the clergy-penitent privilege, citing §§ 16-1605 and 16-1606. Corroborates both the all-person and privilege-preserved classifications.

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• Northwest Public Broadcasting / Associated Press· September 29, 2022
  33 States, Including Washington, Idaho & Oregon, Exempt Clergy From Reporting Abuse

  AP investigation establishing the action-needed context: three Idaho amendments over the prior decade, none seeking to eliminate the clergy-penitent privilege. Also documents the 2013 Boise enforcement-gap case.

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