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🗓️ 11 October 2020
⏱️ 266 minutes
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Brennan Harris’ dad, Kip Brower Harris, took his own life on January 9, 2019, while he was employed as Dean of Students at Brigham Young University - Idaho. During his 30 year career at BYU Idaho, Kip Harris had served twice as a Mormon bishop, served in a Mormon Stake Presidency, and was personal friends with LDS Church apostle David Bednar.
In the final years of his second term as bishop, Kip Harris became involved in an extra-marital affair with a neighbor and ward member. Inexplicably, when Kip Harris was found in a car with this neighbor/ward member by a Sugar City police officer, this police officer informed Kip Harris' LDS church leaders (violating the separation of church and state). Kip Harris' church leaders, in turn, notified Harris' employer (BYU Idaho), who then put Kim Harris on leave (threatening to fire him). This horrific sequence of confidentiality violations led Kim Harris to feel like his only option was to take his own life, which he did in January of 2019. Press coverage of Kip Harris' death can be found here and here.
Brennan Harris, Kip's son, believes that the LDS Church, BYU Idaho, and Sugar City police are all partially responsible for his father’s death. Brennan has written publicly about his father's story at these links:
This is Brennan’s story.
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
0:00.0 | Hello everyone and welcome to another edition of more |
0:04.4 | Histories podcast. I'm your host John D'Alene. It is October 9th, 2020. |
0:10.0 | And today we have a somber, serious interview. |
0:16.6 | About a year and a half ago in January of 2019, many of us saw an article posted |
0:23.7 | across various websites in or news sites in Idaho. |
0:28.8 | One article said BYU Idaho Dean known as Angel on the tractor dies at age 56. |
0:35.4 | Another article said Dean of students passes away. |
0:38.8 | That came from the BYU I scroll. |
0:42.6 | Another one says BYU Idaho Dean of students dies Wednesday. |
0:46.4 | The man who died was named Kip Browar Harris. |
0:51.3 | And he was a beloved Dean of students. |
0:55.6 | In at BYU Idaho, he served as Bishop at least two times. |
1:00.5 | He worked for BYU Idaho for about 30 years. |
1:04.8 | He was personal friends with Elder David, David Bednar. |
1:08.6 | He was a father, he was a husband, and he was loved by many. |
1:13.5 | Without too much time after these articles broke, |
1:17.7 | there emerged some reports on on Reddit that maybe it had been a death by |
1:22.9 | suicide. And over time, Kip's son, Brennan, |
1:29.6 | started speaking out publicly or writing things. |
1:33.4 | And I waited and wanted to make sure and give everyone in the family space |
1:39.2 | because this seemed like a very serious somber story. |
1:42.8 | And it wasn't something that, that, well, I just wanted to give the family lots of space. |
... |
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