OKLAHOMA CITY (KFOR) – An Oklahoma City hospital has filed a restraining order against the founder and director of a church group that’s been protesting outside the hospital and making threats against staff on social media.
The church group, Ekklesia Oklahoma, has been protesting outside Mercy Hospital because Bob Barth, a church member, was battling COVID-19 in the ICU. Barth died on Thursday.
In a recent press release, the group called Mercy Hospital an “evil Marxist controlled death camp” and claimed Barth was “murdered.”
“People are dying, not because of Covid but literally because they’re following Fauci’s death sentence,” Ekklesia’s leader Daniel Navejas said. “The hospital absolutely refuses to help.”
He and two other church members were ticketed by police on Feb. 8 for trespassing.
According to the police report, they told officers “standing here and refusing to move was the only way to get the attention of hospital staff, that getting arrested was the only way they could get publicity for their cause.”
It prompted Mercy Hospital to file for a restraining order against Navejas on Friday.
Court documents say Barth’s wife took “a dangerous, dubious claim that Budesonide is a ‘silver bullet cure’ for COVID-19 as truth.” Budesonide is a steroid typically used to treat asthma.
The documents go on to say, “What followed was a desperate crusade by Ms. Barth to override the medical judgment of Mr. Barth’s treating healthcare professionals in Mercy’s ICU.” She “demanded that providers increase Mr. Barth’s Budesonide dosage from 1 mg every 12 hours to 1 mg every 4 hours.”
According to the court documents, the hospital staff did increase the dosage on Jan. 28, but Bart’s condition “further deteriorated.” He died about two weeks later.
That’s when Navejas, the church leader, reportedly started posting threats on social media, calling one of Barth’s doctors a “murderer,” saying “you are a worthless doctor and you should be ran out of town.”
According to the court documents, members of the group shared the doctor’s address publicly. Mercy’s attorneys said in the filing that he, “his wife, and their small children are in fear for their lives.”
Mercy sent a lengthy letter to hospital staff explaining the ICU would be on lockdown until further notice and security would be posted at the emergency room entrance.
Officials at the hospital sent Nexstar’s KFOR a statement, which reads in part:
There have been many baseless allegations and attacks online this past week about our hospital and co-workers. We have done our absolute best to respond with dignity and respect toward people with a difference of opinion, but we must defend our co-workers.
It’s important that you know every one of the claims made against our hospital and co-workers are categorically untrue. Here’s what you can be absolutely certain of:
• There is no such thing as a Fauci protocol.
• There are no government vouchers for using certain medications or treatments for our patients with COVID-19.
• We do not make money from the heartbreaking deaths of our patients.
• Our co-workers are not murderers.
MERCY HOSPITAL SPOKESPERSON
Nexstar’s KFOR made several attempts to reach Navejas on Tuesday, but did not hear back.