Christian Child Abuse

Pope's crimes against humanity

2011-04-07T08:18:00.000-07:00

http://cityofangels11.blogspot.com/2011/04/write-hague-criminal-court-prosecutor.html
Write Hague Criminal Court Prosecutor by May 11 re Crimes Against Humanity of Pope
.
A prosecutor at The Hague International Criminal Court will soon decide whether to pursue criminal charges against Joseph Ratzinger (otherwise known as the “Pope”) as a German citizen who is complicit in crimes against humanity.

Persons with evidence of crimes committed by the Catholic Church or The Vatican can now write directly to the prosecutor the International Criminal Court in charge of this case, Dr. Luis Moreno Ocampo, according to the two German Lawyers who are applying to prosecute Ratzinger, Christian Sailer and Gert Hetzel.

"It is easy to have impact on the overall decision of The Hague prosecutor, as anyone can write directly with evidence of the crimes that this religious organization has committed," according to an email from Axel Cooley axel@telegracia.com received this week by City of Angels Blog.

"It is vital to do this well before his decision date, May 15, 2011, so that he can utilize this evidence to proceed," writes Cooley.

Send your story and evidence to:

The Prosecutor
The International Criminal Court
Dr. Luis Moreno Ocampo
Maanweg174 NL-2516 AB Den Haag
The Hague,The Netherlands

Cooley writes: "It is also important to enter your name in one of the websites of these websites demonstrating your approval:"

http://www.popeaccountability.org/do-you-approve-/index.php (English)

http://www.der-fall-des-papstes.com/finden-sie-das-gut/index.php (German)

Murderer priest

2011-04-07T08:11:00.000-07:00

http://www.newstimes.com/news/article/Suit-tossed-against-Ohio-convicted-murderer-priest-1326718.php

Suit tossed against Ohio convicted murderer priest
Published 08:15 a.m., Thursday, April 7, 2011
TOLEDO, Ohio (AP) — The Ohio Supreme Court won't hear the appeal of a woman who claims she was sexually abused in satanic rituals by a Roman Catholic priest later convicted of murdering a nun.

The Blade newspaper of Toledo reports the woman said the abuse began when she was a child in the late 1960s and lower courts found that her 2005 lawsuit came too late. The state's highest court on Wednesday declined without comment to review the case.

In a filing with the Supreme Court, an attorney for the Toledo diocese called the allegations against both the Rev. Gerald Robinson and a now deceased Catholic lay teacher "irresponsible," ''untrue" and "tall tales."

Robinson is serving 15 years to life in prison for the 1980 killing of Sister Margaret Ann Pahl.

Read more: http://www.newstimes.com/news/article/Suit-tossed-against-Ohio-convicted-murderer-priest-1326718.php#ixzz1IqlbZMHn

Abuse as punishment

2011-04-07T07:47:00.000-07:00

http://newsok.com/authorities-claim-pastor-used-sex-abuse-as-discipline/article/3556115

Authorities claim pastor used sexual abuse as punishment
Tommy Joe Pitts, 51, was charged Wednesday in Major County District Court with nine felony counts in connection with the sexual assault of three girls. He appeared in court Wednesday afternoon.

BY ANN KELLEY Oklahoman 0 Published: April 7, 2011

FAIRVIEW — A young girl told authorities a Fairview pastor used sexual abuse as punishment.

Tommy Joe Pitts, 51, was charged Wednesday in Major County District Court with nine felony counts in connection with the sexual assault of three girls ages 8, 9, and 12.

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The complaints include two counts of first-degree rape, four counts of lewd molestation and three counts of rape by instrumentation.

Pitts appeared briefly in court Wednesday afternoon with his attorney, Fritz McGee. His bail is set at $1 million.

His wife was in the courtroom. She called the sheriff’s department March 31 to report Pitts molested three girls and was threatening to kill himself. Pitts was arrested after he deliberately drove into the path of a tractor-trailer rig, authorities said. The vehicles did not strike each other and Pitts was not injured, authorities said.

Pitts’ wife said she became suspicious of Pitts when he insisted on spending more time alone with the girls and confronted him about the alleged abuse on March 31.

The 12-year-old girl told authorities when the girls broke a rule Pitts would give them a choice of punishment. He offered the option of getting a spanking or touching his genitals.

Investigators claim they’ve documented more than 70 instances of sexual assault against the three girls.

Pitts, an ordained minster with the Assemblies of God since 2007, was pastor at the Midway Assembly of God in Fairview.

Read more: http://newsok.com/authorities-claim-pastor-used-sexual-abuse-as-punishment/article/3556115#ixzz1IqgsibB7

Confusion

2011-04-07T07:38:00.000-07:00

http://www.su-spectator.com/opinion/confusion-doubt-able-to-coexist-with-religion-1.2145726
Confusion, doubt able to coexist with religion
By Colleen Fontana

Published: Wednesday, April 6, 2011

Updated: Wednesday, April 6, 2011 21:04

Related Articles
Germany: 205 claims of abuse at Jesuit schools
21 Philadelphia priests suspended
Editorial: Church response to abuse not strong enough
The Oregon Province of the Society of Jesus has agreed to pay $166 million to victims of sexual abuse in one of the largest settlements for abuse within the Catholic Church.

It is a sum long overdue.

For decades the victims have carried their burdens and struggled under the long-term effects of abuse. Though the prospect of a settlement must be a relief after a long struggle, the scars of what occurred will never go away.

Thank you to the Seattle University staff for alerting the students to what happened and for notifying us that, though a Jesuit institution, we are not connected to the Oregon Province and this bankruptcy case will not affect us.

However, I believe that it is precisely the fact that we are a Jesuit institution that this does affect us and it is an issue that needs to be addressed and discussed.

According to a recent New York Times article, more than 500 victims were sexually abused at Indian boarding schools years ago. That being only one location, I am horrified by the numbers that could represent worldwide abuses.

I admit I am more invested in this issue than the average college student. My father lost his job within the Diocese of Yakima for speaking out in defense of victims of sexual abuse by our diocese's priests. I was 12 at the time. Initially, I was overwhelmed and discouraged by the fact that the church I had been a part of and believed in for so long was suddenly revealed to have been harboring this secret. Was everything else I believed in suspect as well? If I couldn't trust the priests of my church then how could I trust the institution they helped to create? For years I have pondered this question, never quite fully grasping a solution and never quite feeling secure in my faith. I still attended weekly Mass and youth group, but the aspects I used to see as beautiful just seemed like a façade to what I now knew about the church.

I became frustrated that no one else my age seemed to know or even care. Coming to Seattle U restored my broken beliefs in religion and in God. Here I was able to find a community of people whom I respected immensely for their deep faith.

Though I admire that faith, I also believe that this problem of sexual abuse within the Catholic Church cannot continue to be ignored or minimized.

I am not at all saying students should leave the church or doubt everything they have ever believed. I am simply asserting the dire need for change, and as the youth of the church, I believe it our duty to hold our leaders accountable to protect children and work for just solutions.

I said I never quite landed on a solution for the confusion I felt after the sex abuse scandals surfaced in Yakima. It has been seven years, and it is still a problem I face everyday. But my love and trust in God continues not despite my doubts, but because of them. I truly believe that faith and doubt can coexist. I challenge all students to not just hear about the sex abuse settlements through a short e-mail sent by Seattle U. Dare to learn more, care more and demand more for the future of the church you belong to.

Priest case

2011-04-07T07:30:00.000-07:00

http://www.memphisdailynews.com/editorial/Article.aspx?id=57627
TN Supreme Court Hears Priest Case

The Tennessee Supreme Court is in Jackson, Tenn., Thursday to hear a Memphis civil case involving allegations of child sexual abuse by a Catholic priest that could change the criteria for hearing such claims.

In Norman Redwing v The Roman Catholic Diocese of Memphis, Redwing alleges he was sexually abused during the 1970s by Rev. Milton Guthrie while Guthrie was pastor of the Holy Names parish in North Memphis. Redwing isn’t suing Guthrie, who died in 2002. No criminal charges were filed against Guthrie.

Redwing is suing the Memphis Catholic Diocese claiming it knew or should have known that Guthrie was “a dangerous sexual predator with a depraved sexual interest in young boys.”

Attorneys for the diocese sought to have the case dismissed claiming the statute of limitations had run on the civil claim. Redwing is not claiming that repressed memories of the abuse surfaced. So, the diocese argues, under Tennessee law he had a year after he turned 18 years old to inquire with the diocese to see if they knew of any sexual abuse by Guthrie and what they did. That’s when the statute of limitations began to run.

Redwing filed his lawsuit in 2008.

The standard has come into play in other lawsuits alleging negligence by the diocese involving priests accused of sexually abusing children.

Attorneys for a 14-year-old boy abused by former priest Juan Carlos Duran in Memphis in late 1999 were mindful of the rule and advised the boy and his family to begin making such inquiries when he turned 18.

The boy, identified as John Doe, filed suit against the diocese and the Dominican religious order four years after the abuse when he turned 18. Both defendants settled the suit for $2 million, the largest settlement in any of the Memphis priest sexual abuse cases in which a figure was disclosed.

In the Redwing case, Circuit Court Judge D’Army Bailey, since retired, denied the motion to dismiss the case based on the rule. He questioned whether the standard was “harsh” and should be applied in every case.

The diocese appealed.

The state appeals court in June ruled that Bailey was wrong and the statute of limitations had run in the civil case.

“Notwithstanding the flood of allegations currently posited against the Catholic church worldwide, whether the church as a whole engaged in a systematic coverup is not our inquiry here,” Appeals Court Judge David R. Farmer wrote in the majority opinion. “Had Mr. Redwing filed a lawsuit upon reaching the age of majority, discovery in that case would have provided a mechanism for him to learn that the diocese had been negligent.”

But Appeals Court Judge Holly M. Kirby of Memphis dissented, calling the dismissal “premature.”

She said Redwing and his attorneys should have at least been allowed to conduct discovery with a decision on whether or not he had a case to come after that.

“Even if Mr. Redwing had filed a lawsuit against the priest when he reached majority, there is a substantial possibility that he would not have discovered that he had a claim of negligent supervision against the diocese,” Kirby wrote.

The justices are not expected to rule after hearing from both sides Thursday in Jackson. They will probably issue a written ruling at a later date.

The decision could affect several other civil suits filed against the diocese since 2004 alleging child sexual abuse by a priest.

The John Doe civil suit against the diocese naming Rev. Daniel Dupree was also dismissed for the same reason at issue in the Redwing case. The appeals court majority opinion cites the court’s own ruling in that case to back its decision in the Redwing case.

A second John Doe civil suit against the diocese naming Rev. Paul St. Charles was also dismissed for the same reason.

Church fails in its duty

2011-04-07T07:19:00.000-07:00

http://www.su-spectator.com/opinion/editorial-church-response-to-abuse-not-strong-enough-1.2145664
Editorial: Church response to abuse not strong enough
By The Spectator Staff

Published: Wednesday, April 6, 2011

Updated: Wednesday, April 6, 2011 21:04

Related Articles
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Stories of Jesuit Abuse
US Catholics debate defrocking abusive priests
The Spectator applauds university President Stephen Sundborg, S.J. for his apology to the International Council of Thirteen Indigenous Grandmothers about the abuse some First Nations people suffered at the hands of Jesuits.

As the bankruptcy for the Oregon Province is finalized, past sexual abuse committed by members of the church is once again in the news and it is time to revisit earlier discussions on appropriate measures moving forward. In the article "Claims against two former Jesuits have had huge impact on Seattle U and the larger Catholic community," Fr. Patrick Howell said that the perpetrators of the abuse make up for two to three percent of priests nationwide. The other 97 percent have suffered a major loss of trust with their public.

It is no doubt wrong for the many to suffer from the misdeeds of the few but, even as the abuse cases reach resolution, the Catholic Church as a whole is still not doing enough about these abuse cases. Anyone who sexually abuses a child is a criminal and should be treated as such. Howell said the police should be notified of abuse, so there are clearly some members of the Catholic community who understand the gravity of the situation but other individuals and diocese seem to be trying to protect abusers.

Multiple cases have been reported when a priest who was found to be abusive was reassigned to another position instead of being removed from the priesthood. This is intolerable. Abusive priests should be removed from the priesthood to protect vulnerable populations.

This is the kind of strong action that needs to be taken in order to save the reputation of the majority of priests who are innocent and genuinely concerned for the communities they serve. The church should protect its members who are doing good, forgive the ones who committed crimes, but also ensure they do not commit crimes again.

Priest arraigned

2011-04-07T07:12:00.000-07:00

http://www.contracostatimes.com/california/ci_17788086?nclick_check=1
Judge orders priest to trial
Castillo, 57, accused of molesting boy
Will Bigham, Staff Writer
Posted: 04/06/2011 08:30:24 PM PDT

RANCHO CUCAMONGA - After testimony Tuesday during a preliminary hearing, a judge ruled that prosecutors have enough evidence for a priest's molestation case to proceed to trial.
Alejandro Castillo, the 57-year-old former pastor of Our Lady of Guadalupe Church in Ontario, is accused of molesting a then-12-year-old parishioner in 2008.

Judge Colin J. Bilash ruled Tuesday that Castillo must stand trial on eight counts of committing lewd or lascivious acts with a child. One of the counts alleges the sexual contact was forcible, Deputy District Attorney Karen Schmauss said.

The judge's ruling in West Valley Superior Court came after testimony from Ontario police Detective Mark Guski.

Castillo, called "Father Alex" by parishioners, is accused of molesting the boy at the church between October and December 2008.

Schmauss said Castillo offered to let the boy to spend the night at the church while he was playing soccer in Ontario. The boy, who is now 15, lives outside the city, Schmauss said.

Castillo was arrested Oct. 25, at a parishioner's home in the 600 block of West Zenia Court in Ontario. Police began investigating the abuse allegations in July.

Castillo, who worked at the church for seven years before his arrest, remains free on $300,000 bail. He is next due in court April 28.

Cover-up

2011-04-07T07:02:00.000-07:00

http://www.patheos.com/Resources/Additional-Resources/Criminal-Legacy-of-American-Catholic-Bishops-Marci-Hamilton-04-07-2011.html
The Criminal Legacy of American Catholic Bishops
The basic problem here is that the Philadelphia Archdiocese cannot work itself out of its urge to protect priests before children.
By Marci A. Hamilton, April 06, 2011

Last week, Cardinal Rigali of the Philadelphia Archdiocese announced that two retired priests were being put on "administrative leave." That means that child sex abuse victims had made allegations against them. It is a simple fact that abusers abuse well into their elderly years, so these two men could still be a risk to children.

That brings the number of priests in Philadelphia with allegations against them to twenty-eight. Two were indicted following the 2011 Grand Jury Report, three were named in the Report, twenty-one were suspended in the wake of the report, and now two more.

That is all news, but the monumental indifference of Cardinal Rigali persists. The twenty-three most recently suspended were not named by the Archdiocese, for reasons only their lawyers can understand.

God vs GavelThe Criminal Legacy of American Catholic BishopsThe Ministerial Exception Makes It to the Supreme CourtPhiladelphia Is the Ireland of AmericaPhiladelphia Dysfunction and Guam SuccessThe Court, the Preacher, and the MilitaryAuthor Bio »We eventually learned the identities of the twenty-one suspended active duty priests, no thanks to the Archdiocese. Reporters had to compare previous and current Archdiocese web pages to deduce who they were, and then they had to verify those deductions according to which parishes were notified about the removals.

The most recent two were retired, though, and, therefore, no such comparison could be done because non-active priests are not listed on the website. Some have guessed that one is Fr. Givey. No one outside the Archdiocese knows who the other retired priest is. So now in Philadelphia, we have yet another priest who has allegations of child sex abuse against him, and the people have no idea who it is. Speaking solely as a mother here, if you let your child alone with a priest in Philadelphia, shame on you. And victims will tell you that the more charming he is, the more you need to fear.

The basic problem here is that the Philadelphia Archdiocese cannot work itself out of its urge to protect priests before children. Irish Archbishop Diarmuid Martin, speaking at Marquette University this week, urged American bishops to change their ways. He said: "The truth will set us free." No one understands this fact better than the Irish bishops, who have seen their Church all but shrivel away in Ireland in the wake of the abuse crisis there. Good lesson for Philadelphia, where pettiness continues to dominate transparency.

In a moral universe, Philly's suspended priests would have been delivered up to prosecutors the minute there was an inkling that children were at risk. And the message would have come from many of the adults in these children's lives, from teachers to priests to principals. Priests living in rectories with abusers would have spoken to their local policemen about the kids coming to their fellow priests' rooms, and about the summers at the Shore in Religious Order homes where kids visited certain priests in their rooms. And when news trickled to the Cardinal, whether it was Krol, Bevilacqua, or Rigali, he would have personally called the police to urge them to investigate.

For those who are resting more easily at night now that the Archdiocese has removed nearly thirty priests from active ministry, wake up. Last week, in Madison, Wisconsin, a priest was criminally charged with sexually assaulting a girl in 2003 and 2004. Several years earlier, in 1999, he had been removed from active ministry for taking sexual advantage of a woman who had sought him out for counseling.

Removal from active ministry does not protect our children. All it really does is give the priest more free time to commit more crimes.
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Germans leave church

2011-04-07T06:36:00.000-07:00

http://www.dw-world.de/dw/article/0,,14971010,00.html
German Catholics leave church in droves

Großansicht des Bildes mit der Bildunterschrift: Grand architecture, but empty pews?A record number of Catholics in Germany have turned their backs on the church. They officially cancelled their membership in the wake of child abuse scandals that rocked church institutions across the country.

A record 180,000 German Catholics left their church for good in 2010, and it appears the child abuse scandal was the main reason for the dramatic rise in departures.

Data provided by 24 of Germany's 27 Catholic dioceses and published this week by the newspaper Die Zeit shows that 50,000 more Catholics cancelled their church membership last year than in 2009, an increase of 40 percent.

It was what the church had feared, Alois Glück, head of the lay Central Committee of German Catholics said.

"It's a dramatic signal and a clear message that we have to take the issue seriously; winning back people's trust has to be at the core of our efforts for renewal and dialogue."

Germany has faced revelations over the past year that hundreds of children were physically and sexually abused in church institutions throughout the country. All but a handful run were by the Roman Catholic Church.

It looks likely that this is also the first time in Germany's postwar history that more Catholics officially renounced their church membership than Protestants: Germany's Protestant church estimates that just under 150,000 people left in 2010.

German bishops shocked

The wealthy diocese of Cologne, Germany's largest, saw the biggest drop in membership ever last year. The city's vicar-general, Dominik Schwaderlapp, said the departures were painful for the Catholic church because many people apparently chose to leave the church as "their personal form of protest and of expressing their disgust at the scandal."

Hardest-hit were a handful of dioceses in deeply Catholic Bavaria, which saw up to 70 percent more people leaving the church than the year before.

Matthias Kopp, press spokesman for the German Catholic Bishops' Conference, said that every single person who left was a human loss for the church. "The German bishops won't ignore that, they want to win back lost credibility."

The bishops, who have been criticized for their slow response, have meanwhile offered compensation of up to 5,000 euros ($6,900) to the sexual abuse victims. None of the offenders can be prosecuted because of a three-year statute of limitations. Some of the sexual abuse cases occurred in the 1950s, most of them in the 1970s and 1980s.

In Germany, membership in a religion is more than symbolic - it has a concrete financial significance, as members of a religious group officially recognized by the government in Berlin pay a "church tax" that is automatically deducted from their monthly paychecks.

Family sues archdiocese

2011-04-07T06:25:00.000-07:00

http://www.phillyburbs.com/news/local/courier_times_news/bristol-family-sues-archdiocese/article_7765cbc6-6071-11e0-ac9e-0019bb30f31a.html
Bristol family sues Archdiocese
. Posted: Wednesday, April 6, 2011 1:08 pm | Updated: 4:22 pm, Wed Apr 6, 2011.

Bristol family sues Archdiocese by JAMES McGINNIS Calkins Media, Inc. | 2 comments

A local woman said her son committed suicide in 2009 after Archdiocese of Philadelphia officials chose not to believe his allegations and "compelling evidence" of sexual abuse in the 1980s by a priest at St. Mark Church in Bristol.

"I am not looking for anything other than for the church to believe me," Daniel Neill's family remembers him saying often before his suicide.

In a wrongful death lawsuit against the archdiocese and Cardinal Justin Rigali filed Wednesday morning in Philadelphia Court of Common Pleas, Neill's mother, Mary Neill of Bristol, and sister, Michelle Forsyth of Middletown, allege he was repeatedly abused by the Rev. Joseph Gallagher.

An archdiocesan spokesman declined to comment Wednesday on the suit.

Gallagher, who later served at St. Thomas Aquinas in Croydon, was suspended in February following the release of a second Philadelphia grand jury report on abuse in the church, according to the archdiocese.

The Neill family lawsuit alleges that church officials failed to protect their son and other children. In 1980, Neill, then age 10, first reported abuse to the school principal who "called him a liar and threatened Daniel that his family would be disgraced if he persisted in making his report of sexual abuse," according to the lawsuit. The principal is not named in the suit.

"Despite compelling evidence of child abuse and other inappropriate behavior by Fr. Gallagher, Cardinal Rigali and his agents took no action to protect children from him," according to the suit. While Rigali was not head of the archdiocese when the abuse against Neill is alleged to have occurred, he was at the helm in 2006, when Neill again tried to get the church to listen to him.

The alleged abuse continued even after Neill complained to the principal, the family said in the court paperwork.

When he reached out to the church again five years ago, Neill relayed his story to an archdiocese victims assistance coordinator, according to the grand jury. He said he was fondled, probed and later punched by Gallagher, according to the report.

His allegations were later detailed in the 2011 Philadelphia Grand Jury Report, which identified him under the pseudonym "Ben."

Investigators said Neill provided the church with details about the interior of the priest's mother's house, including a "pink, frilly bedroom," where he allegedly was fondled by Gallagher.

Investigators said that a second boy came forward with allegations of fondling by the same priest.

Church officials contacted Neill in 2008, advising him that his allegations were deemed unsubstantiated and not credible, according to the grand jury.

He committed suicide 11 months later at age 38, the family said.

The lawsuit seeks more than $150,000 in damages for conspiracy to endanger children, fraudulent concealment, and wrongful death.

Through her attorney, Neill's mother released the following statement:

"We carefully and cautiously take this action today hoping that from this loss and from our grief, some good can come, and that the children of this community can be better protected and be believed when they find the will and the way to report abuse of all kinds. It is simply our desire to perhaps get the Archdiocese officials to recognize their obligations and to do a better job of healing the wounded and protecting the children - instead of being concerned about their reputation."

Meanwhile, the allegations in the 2011 grand jury report continue to echo through both the church and the court system.

This is the fourth sexual abuse lawsuit brought against the archdiocese since the grand jury report was released. Attorneys said the report has emboldened their clients to come forward.

The archdiocese suspended 23 priests after the most recent report.

The Philadelphia District Attorney's Office has filed criminal charges against three priests, a former priest, and a teacher. The Rev. James Brennan was arrested and accused of raping a 14-year-old boy he met during his tenure as parochial vicar at St. Andrew Parish in Newtown.

Bernard Shero, a former parochial school teacher from Bristol, the Rev. Charles Engelhardt and the defrocked James Avery are accused of sexually assaulting another boy they met during their tenure at St. Jerome's Parish in Philadelphia.

The Msgr. William Lynn, former secretary of the clergy, faces charges of child endangerment for allegedly reassigning priests but not telling anyone of complaints made against them.

No criminal charges came out of the first grand jury report released in 2005 since any statues of limitation expired. The law has since been changed. Victims now have until age 50, instead of age 30, to report their abuse.

IFB church

2011-04-06T11:48:00.000-07:00

http://blogs.abcnews.com/pressroom/2011/04/a-religious-sub-culture-many-americans-have-never-heard-of-yet-has-thousands-of-churches-across-the-.html
A RELIGIOUS SUB-CULTURE MANY AMERICANS HAVE NEVER HEARD OF, YET HAS THOUSANDS OF CHURCHES ACROSS THE COUNTRY ... CHURCHES THAT CRITICS CLAIM CAN FOSTER PHYSICAL AND SEXUAL ABUSE
April 06, 2011 11:14 AM

SpaceNewsvineRedditDeliciousMixxYahooElizabeth Vargas’ Yearlong Investigation Into The Independent Fundamental Baptist Church, Airs On “20/20,” Friday, April 8, 10-11 PM ET

Try to imagine the pain and humiliation of a teenage girl, just 15 years old, who says she was forced to stand in front of a New Hampshire church congregation and confess her "sin" of being pregnant. She says not only was she forced to confess her pregnancy, but also to ask for their forgiveness – with no mention of the man she says sexually abused her. After all, she says, the pastor told her it's better than being stoned to death as the bible describes. That is what Tina Anderson alleged happened to her at her ultra conservative Independent Fundamental Baptist, or IFB, Church. The IFB has thousands of congregations across the country, but many people have never heard of it. That was, until another woman, Jocelyn Zichterman, began a public campaign – armed with nothing but a computer and memories of her own alleged abuse that she says church beliefs can foster. And survivors are now coming out of the woodwork, to say she's not alone.

Elizabeth Vargas’ yearlong exclusive investigation into a religious sub-culture that critics claim can foster – even cover up – physical and sexual abuse airs on “20/20” on FRIDAY, APRIL 8 (10:00 – 11:00 p.m. ET) on the ABC Television Network. Critics say the church teaches a strict interpretation of the bible including the practice known as breaking the will of the child, with some advocating that it even be applied to infants as young as two weeks old.

“I had a decision to make that either I was going to kind of curl up in the corner and be quiet or I was going to stand up for my family and tell the truth,” says Jocelyn Zichterman.

Pastor Chuck Phelps, the former pastor at Tina Anderson’s New Hampshire church, denies Tina was disciplined by the church or that there was any attempt to cover up a crime. He declined repeated interview requests but provided a statement: “Tina was involved in an ongoing sexual relationship with Mr. Ernie Willis… Tina lied to her mother and to me about this relationship.” He also said he brought the allegations to the attention of police who failed to investigate further. Ernie Willis, Tina Anderson’s alleged attacker has pleaded not guilty to sexual assault.

Brian Fuller, the current pastor at Tina’s former IFB church, says all IFB Churches operate independently and that his church has nothing to hide. He opened his doors to “20/20” cameras, was critical of how Tina’s case was handled and denounced any abusive disciplinary practices, adding: “The Bible says that I’m supposed to love my children, I’m never supposed to ever do anything out of anger or manipulation. And that’s what our people are taught here,” he told Vargas.

“20/20” is anchored by Elizabeth Vargas and Chris Cuomo. David Sloan is executive producer.

Priest charged

2011-04-06T11:41:00.000-07:00

http://www.miamiherald.com/2011/04/06/2153395/priest-charged-in-child-sex-case.html

Priest charged in child sex case ordered to trial
The Associated Press
SAN BERNARDINO, Calif. -- A Southern California priest has been ordered to stand trial on felony charges he had sex with a 12-year-old boy.

A San Bernardino County judge ruled after a preliminary hearing on Tuesday that there was enough evidence to try the Rev. Alejandro Jose Castillo. He is charged with seven counts of lewd and lascivious acts with a child under age 14 and one count of forcible lewd and lascivious acts with a child under age 14.

The Riverside Press-Enterprise reports Castillo will be arraigned on April 28.

Prosecutors say he was pastor of Our Lady of Guadalupe Catholic Church in Ontario when he molested the boy in late 2008 but has been removed.

Parishioners affiliated with the Coalition to Exonerate Fr. Alex raised $24,000 to bail Castillo out of jail.

Read more: http://www.miamiherald.com/2011/04/06/2153395/priest-charged-in-child-sex-case.html#ixzz1IlmvbMbG

Hungarian scandal

2011-04-06T07:27:00.000-07:00

http://www.pestiside.hu/20110406/hungarys-very-dirty-and-very-hungarian-dirty-priest-scandal/
Hungary's Very Dirty (And Very Hungarian) Dirty Priest Scandal

In February, Julius Janus, a Polish clergyman who had been the longtime Papal nuncio in Hungary, was abruptly transferred out of the country. At the time, the reasons for his leaving were unclear. But according to Index.hu and other sources, the sudden exit of the Vatican's top representative was related to allegations that he had assisted in the cover-up of homosexual indiscretions involving top Hungarian clerics, and that proof of his malfeasance could be found in confidential letters dispatched under his signature.

While lurid in its own right, Janus's departure - apparently a "transfer" to the Balkans - is only the latest in a series of bombshells to hit Hungary's Catholic Church, some involving not crimes of lust but that most Hungarian of deadly sins, financial fraud.

Accused and accuser: Former Pécs Bishop Mayer and priest Wolf (top), former Papal nuncio Janus (with accordion) and crusading editor Wildmann (below right), whose publication shed light on the dark doings in the Pécs diocese.

At the center of the charges is the former Bishop of Pécs, Mihály Mayer, whose resignation - which may have been forced - was accepted by Pope Benedict XVI earlier this year. Appointed to his position in the dramatic year of 1989 - on the Friday before the Thursday on which the Berlin Wall fell - Mayer was an outspoken conservative on doctrinal issues, particularly on the importance of clerical celibacy, and during his tenure he frequently weighed in publicly on issues of culture, morality, and history. From early on he was also a powerful advocate for the restitution of church property that had been seized by the communists, which in Pécs was quite considerable.

Mayer's downfall began as a decidedly dull dispute over the financing of a local Catholic elementary school, which had simmered for years in the pages of a left-leaning ecumenically-oriented religious journal, Egyházfórum ("Church Forum"). At the time, the journal's editor, János Wildmann, privately sought to warn church leaders that the Pécs diocese was a "time bomb." Wildmann's advice went unheeded. But it was proven painfully accurate when the Baranya County Prosecutor's Office announced last October an investigation into a close confidant of Bishop Mayer, diocese financial director - and, as it apparently turned out, pederasty enthusiast - Father Gyula Wolf. The investigation of the diocese appears to have been prompted by a 65-page document submitted to the prosecutor allegedly pointing to over 40 different crimes, including embezzlement, document forgery, and - this being Hungary - VAT fraud.

Most of the charges revolve around alleged financial irregularities involving a company called Fény Kft. ("Light Ltd."), the diocese's service administration firm, which was managed by Father Wolf and owned by the Bishop's private foundation, Gaudium Nostrum (literally: "our gaiety.") On top of this, there were also allegations involving the more traditional forms of "white collar" church crime, including sexual abuse of minors.

Hungary's post-Communist educational system provides for state funding of parochial schools via the dioceses, which receive subsidies from the government and then they transfer them to individual schools under their supervision. In 2006, the headmaster of Pécs' Szent Mór elementary school publicly conceded that the reason the school could not pay its teachers and its heating bill promptly was because the Pécs diocese had been routinely transferring the school's allotted state funds six or more months late. When the headmaster was removed from her position by the diocese - which accused her of fiscal incompetence - she and the school's parents argued their case in the pages of Egyházfórum. Three later independent audits of Szent Mór's accounting ultimately vindicated the headmaster's claims. The withholding of state funds and embezzlement of approximately $500,000 would be one of two charges against the diocese made public in November.

This case was followed by an additional charge involving a Catholic school in Paks. According to Index, Mayer had persuaded the school management to sign over their building to Fény Ltd. in exchange for the construction of a new gymnasium. Although the ownership of the school - worth Ft 500 million - was transferred to the company, as of now, the promised athletic facility has not been built.

Further allegations involve the disposal of real estate which residents of diocese-operated retirement homes were said to have turned over to Fény Ltd. - and which were subsequently sold at below market rates to Wolf's circle of friends. A circle of friends that, by the way, our own sources in Pécs say largely consists of Wolf's "boyfriends."

Although the allegations of financial misconduct have dominated much of the local coverage of the Mayer/Wolf scandal, Egyházfórum has continued to push hard on the charges of sexual abuse. In particular, its articles claim that Bishop Mayer had rebuffed "in a strange manner" the entreaties of well-intentioned parents concerned about an unnamed priest who taught religious education classes.

Those issues, however, came to widespread attention last month, when the police announced they had seized the computer of the parish priest of Bóly, a small town within the Pécs diocese, and discovered a large cache of child pornography on it. The investigation had been requested by international anti-crime agency Interpol on the basis of German police monitoring.

Szombathely bishop András Veres has been appointed to lead the Pécs diocese until a permanent replacement for Mayer is selected. Wildmann believes that criminal charges against Mayer are unlikely, given that he holds a knighthood in the Equestrian Order of the Holy Sepulchre of Jerusalem, which grants him diplomatic immunity in Hungary. Then again, he may not need the immunity, since, when has any bishop or similarly senior Church official been prosecuted for these kind of crimes? And, anyway, this is Hungary.

Editor's Note: The above article was written by Budapest-based scholar Jeffrey Taylor, based on both his original reporting and other media sources. Related articles from the Pestiside archives can be found here (2009), here (2007), here (2006) and here (2004).

New name

2011-04-06T07:20:00.000-07:00

http://www.snapnetwork.org/snap_statements/2011_statements/040511_group_blasts_bishop_for_schools_new_name.htm
Group blasts bishop for school’s new name

Statement by Barbara Dorris of St. Louis, Outreach Director of SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (314 862 7688 home, 314 503 0003 cell, SNAPdorris@gmail.com)

There are thousands of devout Catholic lay people and saints and priests who never once ignored or concealed clergy sex crimes. Name the school after any of them. But not, as Pittsburgh’s Bishop Zubik is doing, after his predecessor, Archbishop Donald Wuerl (now of DC).

Why rub salt into already deep and still fresh wounds of suffering clergy sex abuse victims and disillusioned Catholics by naming it after Wuerl?

In Louisiana, one school, named after a Catholic bishop, had to be re-named when it was discovered that the bishop had molested kids.

That likely won't happen with Wuerl. But who knows what evidence may yet surface showing his complicity in clergy sex crimes and cover ups. (Remember, just last year damning evidence emerged from decades ago that the pope ignored and concealed crimes in his home diocese in Germany.)

Wuerl was a Pittsburgh Catholic official from 1988 to 2006 and a Wash DC church official from 2006 until now. Is there a single person who really believes Wuerl handled each and every clergy sex abuse and cover up case in those two dioceses perfectly?

Somewhere there’s a woman who was raped as a child by a Pittsburgh priest. She feels doubly betrayed because she was treated callously or deceptively by a Pittsburgh church official when she reported the crime to them. How will she feel when she learns that a school will be named in honor of Wuerl? She’ll feel betrayed a third time.

Why would Catholic officials take this risk? How can Zubik be so callous?

Consider just a few aspects of Wuerl’s track record on abuse:
--Just three months ago, we disclosed the names of three credibly accused predator priests who have worked in the DC area but whose identities as molesters had never been publicly disclosed here before. (Fr. Donald Joyce, Fr. Myron F. Bullock and Fr. Walter Dayton Salisbury.) We urged Wuerl to aggressively reach out to their victims. We are particularly worried about Salisbury because he has been convicted twice for molesting kids and was found in December living in public housing and serving on a local government board in Maine.

As best we can tell, Wuerl has done nothing to warn his flock about or reach out to other victims of these clerics.
--Roughly 24 US bishops have posted on their websites the names of proven, admitted and credibly accused predator priests. Wuerl didn’t do that in Pittsburgh. He’s not doing it in DC. He is, like most of his colleagues, opting for secrecy over openness and making it harder, not easier, for parents to protect their kids from child molesters.
--While in Pittsburgh, Wuerl opposed measures to safeguard Pennsylvania kids through new state laws that would have better enabled victims to expose child predators in court.

Wuerl, like Mahony and Dolan, is one of the most PR-savvy bishops in the world. But he has essentially been just as determined, and even more successful, than his peers in keeping child sex cases quiet.

During his tenure in Pittsburgh, he benefited from some of the nation’s most restrictive and predator-friendly laws which effectively blocked all but a tiny handful of victims from bringing criminal or civil charges against pedophile priests and exposing corrupt church officials. Wuerl is one of a handful of US Catholic prelates who assiduously works at burnishing his public image and has escaped much of the scrutiny on his misdeeds with the church’s on-going clergy sex scandal.

He dodged a bullet when, years ago, a Pennsylvania Supreme Court ruling tossed out dozens of civil child sex abuse and cover up lawsuits, any of which could have exposed stunning deceit, callousness and recklessness in the Pittsburgh diocese.

In 2004, we said this about Wuerl: “While publicly posturing as a "reformer" on this issue, he allows his PR staff to attack the motives of victims and their attorneys, and refuses to publicly name known and suspected abusive clergy. He bought one half hour of prime time local television to run basically a selr-serving "infomercial" about how well his diocese is handling abuse, but refused to allow a victim on the panel. Wuerl has ignored requests to help warn West Virginia families about an abusive priest from Pittsburgh (Fr. Jack Hoehl) who is now practicing in that state as a counselor.”

Some give Wuerl credit for defrocking a predator priest, Anthony Cipolla, in 2002, claiming Wuerl moved more quickly against Cipolla than some of his brother bishops did against child molesting clerics. That’s the wrong yardstick, however.

One reason we’re in this mess – with hundreds of thousands of kids across the globe molested by tens of thousands of priests – is because bishops cover for one another and refuse to even verbally rebuke their most corrupt colleagues. For bishops, it’s a comfortable and safe culture. For most of the rest of the church and society, it’s dangerous and unhealthy. Rather than fight this sick culture, Zubik is perpetuating it.

There are thousands of devout Catholic lay people and saints and priests who never once ignored or concealed clergy sex crimes. Name the school after any of them. But not after a bishop who, like most of his colleagues, is more concerned with his own reputation than with children’s safety.

Youth leader arraigned

2011-04-06T07:11:00.000-07:00

http://www.columbian.com/news/2011/apr/05/former-youth-pastor-faces-charges-of-molestation/
Former church youth leader faces charges of molestationHe allegedly touched teens inappropriately
.By Bob Albrecht
Columbian Staff Reporter

Originally published April 5, 2011 at 6:39 p.m., updated April 5, 2011 at 9:48 p.m.

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Vancouver man pleads guilty to pair of sex crimes
A former volunteer youth leader at a Vancouver church was arraigned Tuesday on allegations he sexually molested two teenage boys during private devotions.

Defense attorney Jon McMullen told the judge that Jason L. Wolk, 25, understood the charges and didn’t need them read aloud. Wolk pleaded not guilty to one count of second-degree child molestation and four counts of third-degree child molestation. The sexual abuses allegedly took place between June and December 2010.

Clark County Superior Court Judge Roger Bennett set trial for July 5.

A half-dozen members of the boys’ families sat near the back of the courtroom during the brief hearing. Two women who identified themselves as the mothers of the boys, ages 15 and 16, said they’re upset Wolk remains free to “walk the streets.”

The Columbian is not identifying the women to protect the teens’ identities.

“The two victims aren’t doing as well as I anticipated, especially my son,” said the older boy’s mother. “He’s on suicide watch.”

The other woman described the ordeal as “devastating.”

“I thought of him as a son,” she said of Wolk.

The former volunteer youth leader remains out of police custody. He is under a specialized set of supervised release conditions that, among other things, prohibit him from having any contact with minors and require him to remain employed.

McMullen said afterward he’s still working on obtaining police reports and reviewing evidence. He said after Wolk’s first appearance, there are “two sides to every story.”

The teens’ version is that Wolk, a volunteer at Vancouver Wesleyan Church, inappropriately touched them during private devotions designed to help with their “Christian life walk.”

At least one instance of abuse is alleged to have occurred on a camping trip in Klickitat County. Others were alleged to have taken place in Wolk’s home.

The 15-year-old told detectives he and Wolk read while lying on his bed with Wolk’s arm around the boy’s shoulders, according to court documents. On at least one occasion, the teen said that Wolk made him strip down to his boxers and lie in bed with him. On about five occasions, the boy told detectives, Wolk touched him inappropriately over his clothes.

A restraining order against Wolk was filed by the 16-year-old in December.

The case was investigated by the Children’s Justice Center in Clark County.

The two families continue to attend their church.

“We actually have a lot of support,” one of the mothers said.

Priest returned for trial

2011-04-06T02:40:00.000-07:00

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/ireland/2011/0406/1224294011917.html
Retired priest faces trial for alleged indecent assaults
BARRY ROCHE

Wed, Apr 06, 2011

A RETIRED priest has been returned for trial by judge and jury on two counts of indecently assaulting two teenage girls while serving in the diocese of Cloyne in Co Cork about 30 years ago.

Fr Daniel Duane (73), the Presbytery, Cecilstown, Mallow, is charged with indecently assaulting one of the girls in Mallow between September 1st, 1980, and April 1st, 1982.

Fr Duane is charged with indecently assaulting the second girl on a separate occasion in Mallow, also between September 1st, 1980, and April 1st, 1982.

At Mallow District Court yesterday, Garda Insp Declan O’Sullivan confirmed that two separate books of evidence relating to the two charges had been served on Fr Duane by Det Garda Colman Murphy of Mallow Garda station.

Garda Insp O’Sullivan said the Director of Public Prosecutions had consented to the matter being dealt with by way of indictment at Circuit Court level and he applied to have Fr Duane sent forward for trial to the next sittings of Cork Circuit Criminal Court, starting on May 10th.

Judge Eamon O’Brien granted the application and returned Fr Duane for trial at the Washington Street courthouse in Cork on that date.

Learning that gardaí had no objection to bail, Judge O’Brien remanded Fr Duane on continuing bail of €500.

Fr Duane, who recently underwent a hip replacement operation and attended court on crutches, was granted legal aid.

© 2011 The Irish Times

Wrongful death suit

2011-04-06T02:35:00.000-07:00

http://www.newsworks.org/index.php/the-feed/item/16617-lawyers-to-announce-wrongful-death-suit-against-archdiocese
Lawyers to announce wrongful death suit against Archdiocese
April 5, 2011

By Shannon McDonald Rate This: 1 2 3 4 5 (0 votes)

Archdiocese suit announcement canceled
A press conference to announce an abuse suit against the Archdiocese of Philadelphia was canceled last week, only to be rescheduled for tomorrow. But some details have changed.

A group of lawyers will announce a wrongful death suit against the diocese stemming from the suicide of a former St. Mark's altar boy.

Known as "Ben," the Bucks County man's suicide was detailed in the Philadelphia Grand Jury report that charged a teacher, monsignor and three priests with abuse, and questioned the activity of 37 others.

The attorneys will file the suit with the Court of Common Pleas tomorrow.

Statute of limitations

2011-04-06T02:30:00.001-07:00

http://www.catholicculture.org/news/headlines/index.cfm?storyid=9874
Belgian bishop will not face criminal charges for abuse
April 05, 2011
A Belgian bishop acknowledged that he had molested a young boy will not face charges, because the abuse, committed in the 1980s, is covered by that country's statute of limitations.

Bishop Roger Vangheluwe resigned his post as Bishop of Brugge in April 2010, as reports surfaced that he had abused his nephew repeatedly over a period of years. Later in 2010, it was revealed that Cardinal Godfried Danneels of Brussels had urged the victim to remain silent until Bishop Vangheluwe had retired quietly. Cardinal Danneels also stepped down in 2010, although in his case the resignation was overdue because he was 76 years old: more than a year beyond the normative retirement age.

Source(s): these links will take you to other sites, in a new window.

•Belgian bishop cannot be charged (UCAN)
•Belgian cardinal told victim to be silent until bishop who abused him retired (CWN 8/30/10)

Intimidation

2011-04-06T02:19:00.000-07:00

http://www.snapnetwork.org/snap_press_releases/2011_press_releases/040411_nh_bishop_trying_to_out_john_doe_victim.htm
NH bishop trying to "out" John Doe victim

NH Voice of the Faithful April 4, 2011
Statement of Carolyn Disco 603-424-3120
Survivor Support Chairman cell 917-620-8172

Bishop John McCormack’s intimidation of clergy abuse survivor unconscionable

We are here today to challenge Bishop John McCormack to honor his pledge to treat clergy abuse survivors with care and concern, not harassment through punitive legal measures.

A survivor filed a lawsuit last July related to abuse as an 11-year old altar boy by Fr. George St. Jean at St. Brendan’s parish in Colebrook, NH. St. Jean, whose name was released by the Attorney General’s Office in 2009, was a member of the Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate, also a defendant in the case. He died in 1982.

The lawsuit was filed under John Doe, to keep his name confidential from the public up to the point of trial, since anonymous trials are prohibited. However, the survivor’s identity was provided to the Court, the Diocese and the Oblate order. All three know who and where he is.

This arrangement is acceptable to the Oblates who do not object to the survivor proceeding now as a John Doe, according his lawyer’s objection to the Diocese’s motion to dismiss. This is because they have “no desire to cause the Plaintiff (survivor) more pain” by forcing him to disclose his identity publicly in the text of the lawsuit.

Further, “Counsel for the two parties (Oblates and survivor) have agreed to revisit the issue at a later date, should it appear this case will proceed to trial. Sometimes a settlement may be negotiated in the interim, in which case confidentiality is preserved.

The same arrangement was repeatedly offered to the Diocese, hoping McCormack likewise would have “no desire to cause more pain.” Instead, the bishop flat out rejected that approach, and filed a motion to dismiss. Incredibly, the motion includes forcing the survivor to pay the Diocese’s legal bills as well. This is unconscionable.

The case is filled with the usual motions, affidavits, memorandum of law, orders, reconsiderations and objections. But now the outstanding issue is the judge’s ruling on the survivor’s objection to dismissal of the case.

Earlier, the survivor filed an affidavit that described his reasons for not identifying himself publicly. He mentioned the shame, embarrassment, and fears of the consequences of exposure. His wife is aware of

the abuse, but not his children, extended family, and co-workers.

His health is a serious concern, given a history of depression, anxiety, and thoughts of suicide – all subject to being worsened by forced disclosure of his identity. In addition, his wife is currently being treated for breast cancer, with all the stresses that accompany such difficult treatment procedures. He is particularly concerned about burdening her strength at such a vulnerable time.

He outlined his fears of people perhaps blaming his parents, possible retaliation in the community for suing a religious institution, and economic consequences in his employment. The anxiety is simply debilitating.

Trial date set

2011-04-06T02:12:00.000-07:00

http://www.13wham.com/news/local/story/Trial-Date-Set-for-Pastor-Accused-of-Sexual/D5eL3WEqzkWRRHtdIBgiwA.cspx
Trial Date Set for Pastor Accused of Sexual Contact With a Child
Images
Print Story Published: 4/05 12:20 pm Share Updated: 4/05 12:28 pmRochester, N.Y.- The trial for a pastor accused of having sexual contact with a child is scheduled to start in June.

Joe Flowers is the founder of Walk of Life Christian Center in Rochester.

In September, he pleaded not guilty to the charge of course of sexual conduct against a child.

Investigators say the abuse happened for three years.

In court on Tuesday, Judge James Piampiano denied a request by Flowers' defense attorney to lower bail.

If convicted of the charges against him, Flowers could spend seven years in prison.

Priests removed

2011-04-05T08:25:00.000-07:00

http://www.theage.com.au/victoria/church-removes-guilty-priests-20110405-1d2y5.html
Church removes guilty priests Barney Zwartz
April 6, 2011

TWO Melbourne Catholic priests guilty of sexual abuse have been removed from the priesthood, Melbourne Vicar-General Bishop Les Tomlinson confirmed yesterday.

The news was sent to Melbourne priests in the Vicar-General's newsletter, but victims - while welcoming the removals - said they were angry they had not been told.

One priest, Paul Pavlou, formerly of Healesville, was defrocked by the Vatican, while the other, Barry Whelan, was laicised - made a layman - at his own request, reportedly so he could get married.

Advertisement: Story continues below In the Magistrates Court two years ago, Pavlou admitted indecent acts against a 14-year-old boy and possessing child pornography, and was given an 18-month suspended jail sentence.

In Whelan's case, the Melbourne Archdiocese has compensated at least three vulnerable women whom it agreed Whelan took advantage of or abused. One woman bore him a child.

Bishop Tomlinson said neither had been acting as a priest in Melbourne for a long time. ''When serious allegations are made against a priest, especially if they involve charges by the police, the priest is stood down,'' he said.

Advocate Helen Last of In Good Faith, who has worked with some Whelan victims, said: ''This is an important decision. Victims have been calling for the defrocking of their clerical offenders for a long time.

''Finally, something has been done, but they have been overlooked and not notified. Again, they are not considered important enough to be kept in the picture.''

A senior Melbourne Catholic who asked not to be named said that after years of inaction about removing sexual abusers from the priesthood, the Vatican had changed tack to remove them as fast as possible.

''The church is running scared. Now they are as keen as mustard to do it as soon as they can because it stops the abusers being a financial liability,'' he said. After they are laicised, the church is not liable for future offences, or for the costs of maintaining the priest.

Asked whether the church was unjustly criticised over the slow pace of the laicisation of abusers, Bishop Tomlinson said: ''It's true that many people view the church and problems with abusers with just what they know, but sometimes obligations are such that it's not possible to divulge everything that is happening, and people jump to inaccurate conclusions.''

Priest charged

2011-04-05T08:14:00.000-07:00

http://www.goerie.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20110405/NEWS02/304059972/-1/NEWSSITEMAP
Catholic priest from Erie diocese charged in Bradford
By TIM HAHN, Erie Times-News
BRADFORD -- A priest in the Catholic Diocese of Erie has been relieved of his duties and placed on administrative leave in the wake of charges that he had an inappropriate relationship with a 15-year-old boy.

The Rev. Samuel B. Slocum, 59, has been relieved of his duties at St. Francis of Assisi Catholic Church in Bradford and Our Mother of Perpetual Help Catholic Church in Lewis Run. Both churches are in McKean County.

Slocum faces six criminal charges, including felony counts of interference with the custody of children and concealment of the whereabouts of a child, for incidents that state police said happened in Lewis Run, south of Bradford, between Jan. 1 and March 29.

The charges were filed on Friday. Slocum had not appeared in court to face them as of Monday, according to court records.

"It is an ongoing investigation," Trooper Bruce Morris, spokesman for state police Troop C in Punxsutawney, said Monday. "There might be more charges coming from this. Then again, there may not be."

Bishop Donald W. Trautman said in a statement issued Monday afternoon that he immediately placed Slocum on a leave of absence and revoked his diocesan faculties.

Slocum is not permitted to exercise any ministry in the church, Trautman said.

"While the charges filed against him at this point are most serious, it is my understanding there is no criminal allegation of inappropriate sexual activity. Nevertheless, I view the conduct described in the criminal complaint as devastating, if true," Trautman said in the release.

Slocum is a former Cathedral Preparatory School teacher and weekend assistant at Holy Trinity Catholic Church in Erie.

He is a native of St. Elizabeth of Hungary Catholic Church, Smethport, and was ordained May 16, 1980. He studied for the priesthood at Christ the King Seminary, East Aurora, N.Y.

The allegations against Slocum were reported to state police on March 29, when Trooper Daniel Woods spoke to the boy's mother at the McKean County Office of Children and Youth.

Woods accused Slocum of allowing the 15-year-old boy to visit his residence after the boy's mother had forbidden it, and of lying to the mother when she asked if her son had gone to his residence.

Woods said the boy's mother sent Slocum a letter informing him of the prohibition on Jan. 18, eight days after the boy had skipped school and spent the day at Slocum's residence.

The boy's mother spoke to Slocum on Feb. 24 and asked him to have no further contact with her son because the boy had recently gone to Slocum's residence after school without permission, according to the affidavit of probable cause that police filed with the charges.

Slocum denied the visit, but the boy admitted to it, according to the affidavit.

The boy's mother also told Slocum during that conversation that she would contact the diocese if Slocum continued to have contact with her son, Woods said.

The boy's mother gave Woods iPhones, an iPod and an Apple laptop computer that she said Slocum had given her son to use in communicating with him via Facebook, e-mail and text messages, according to the affidavit.

Woods said the woman also provided him with printed excerpts from her son's Facebook account of conversations between her son and Slocum.

In one of the conversations, Slocum allegedly told the boy that he didn't think he should let his mother know that he had Slocum's laptop. In another, Slocum allegedly asks the boy how his mother found out that the boy was at Slocum's house, and he tells the boy that "we will have to be more careful in the future," according to the affidavit. In another series of conversations attributed to Slocum that are listed in the affidavit, Slocum talks of sneaking over to the boy's house to leave something for him.

Woods interviewed the 15-year-old boy later on the afternoon of March 29. The boy told Woods that he had been alone with Slocum at Slocum's residence on more than one occasion, and that Slocum had given him several gifts, according to the affidavit.

State police served a search warrant on Slocum's Lewis Run residence on the evening of March 29 and said they seized several computers, a cell phone and a digital camera. They also spoke to Slocum, who admitted to using his computers and his cell phone to chat with the 15-year-old boy and other juveniles through Facebook and e-mail, according to the affidavit.

Police said Slocum also admitted to having contact with the 15-year-old boy after he was forbidden to do so, and to leaving a present on the boy's porch when he knew he wasn't supposed to contact the boy.

Slocum additionally told police that he had taken digital photographs of the boy and of other juveniles, and he stated numerous times that his relationship with the boy and the other juveniles was inappropriate, according to the affidavit.

Police said they served a search warrant on another of Slocum's residences in McKean County on March 30 and seized two Apple computers. They also interviewed three other boys on Wednesday, and were told that Slocum gave the 15-year-old boy several expensive gifts for no reason, according to the affidavit.

The Catholic Diocese of Erie has assigned the Rev. Walter Packard to take over at the two churches where Slocum had served as pastor, the Bradford Era reported. Packard most recently was assigned to Holy Cross Catholic Church in Fairview Township.

Trautman said Monday that his prayers go out to the parishioners of the two churches, and to all who have been hurt in any way by the matter.

"If the allegations are shown to be true, I am doubly saddened not only by the pain of victims but also by the betrayal of confidence and trust on the part of a priest," Trautman said.

Priest sentenced

2011-04-05T08:10:00.000-07:00

http://www.news.com.au/breaking-news/priest-sentenced-for-assaulting-masseuse/story-e6frfku0-1226034216116

Priest sentenced for assaulting masseuse
From: AAP April 05, 2011 5:24PM Increase Text Size Decrease Text Size Print Add to Myspace Add to Newsvine What are these? A PRIEST kept his victim in terror as he held her in a bedroom, slapped her and told her he was going to rape her.

The 36-year-old priest, who cannot be identified, has been sentenced to two and a half years' jail for kidnapping, assaulting and compelling an act of sexual manipulation on a female masseuse.

He'd detained the woman at an Adelaide house and ordered her to perform sexual acts, including sucking on the heel of her own shoe.

South Australian District Court judge Michael Thomas Boylan, during sentencing on Tuesday, said the priest had acted "despicably" when he attacked the woman after she let him in a house in Modbury, in Adelaide's northeast, on July 13, 2009.

"You behaved despicably and took advantage of her vulnerability for your own gratification," he said.

"You have lost your standing in the community ... as a result of your crime."

The victim's occupation involved massaging clients with optional sexual stimulation offered at the conclusion of the service.

The judge said the victim took the priest to one of the bedrooms of the house where the offender requested two female masseuses.

"In my view, you were checking to see if she was alone in the house," the judge said.

The offender then grabbed the victim, dragged her and told her he would rape her.

"I want you to do me for free, I want to rape you," the judge recounted the offender as saying.

The judge said the offender detained the victim in the bedroom, keeping her there in terror, ordering her to perform sexual acts including sucking on the heel of her own shoe.

"You kept her in terror," he said.

"She could not get away from you ... (The victim) begged you to let her go, you slapped her across the face, throughout all that was going on (the victim) continued to cry.

"She feels lucky to be alive ... She is now terrified of any man which resembles you."

The judge said he accepted the priest had done good work in the community and had no prior convictions.

"I accept in your pastoral work and generally you have helped many people," he said.

But, the judge said, the priest's lack of remorse and maintenance of his innocence made it difficult to mitigate his sentence.

Read more: http://www.news.com.au/breaking-news/priest-sentenced-for-assaulting-masseuse/story-e6frfku0-1226034216116#ixzz1If5Sn7ZG

Priest charged

2011-04-05T08:06:00.001-07:00

http://thetimes-tribune.com/news/susquehanna-county-priest-has-charges-bound-over-1.1128106

Susquehanna County priest has charges bound over
BY ROBERT L. BAKER (Staff Writer)Published: April 5, 2011

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MONTROSE - A monastery priest accused of sexually assaulting a teen boy has been suspended and relieved of duties, according to a statement released by the church Monday, the same day the Susquehanna County cleric had his charges bound over to county court.

The Rev. Phillip Albert Ferrara, 48, of 550 Lake of the Meadows Road, Little Meadows, waived his right to a preliminary hearing before Magisterial District Judge Jeffrey Hollister on three counts of indecent assault of a person under the age of 16 and three corruption-of-minor charges stemming from incidents that occurred between Nov. 3 and Jan. 2. All are misdemeanor counts.

According to a police affidavit, the Rev. Ferrara allegedly told a 14-year-old boy his sperm duct was blocked and was causing him intense back pain and a massage would help. The juvenile was on retreat with his family at Our Lady of Solitude monastery, 550 Lake of Meadows Drive, Apolacon Twp., at the time of the alleged incidents.

The victim said he had massaged the Rev. Ferrara's penis with his feet on two occasions, according to the affidavit.

Archbishop Cyril Bustros of the Melkite Eparchy in Newton, Mass., released a statement that upon learning of the credible occurrence of abuse of a minor, the "Rev. Ferrara was immediately suspended and relieved of all priestly duties and placed in a treatment center for evaluation." Archbishop Bustros said the church"is profoundly saddened by this event and offers deep apologies and prayers to the victim and family. The Diocese of Newton is committed to the protection of all God's children and will take swift action in responding to all allegations of abuse."

The Rev. Ferrara is free on $10,000 unsecured bail. His formal arraignment is Tuesday, April 26

Read more: http://thetimes-tribune.com/news/susquehanna-county-priest-has-charges-bound-over-1.1128106#ixzz1If4Vnm00

Priest charged

2011-04-05T08:00:00.000-07:00

http://www.rte.ie/news/2011/0405/duaned.html
Priest in court on sex assault charges
Updated: 15:49, Tuesday, 5 April 2011
A retired priest from the Diocese of Cloyne in Co Cork has been sent forward for trial on charges of indecently assaulting two teenage girls in the 1980s.

1 of 1 Diocese of Cloyne - Retired priest appears in court on indecent assault charges A retired priest from the Diocese of Cloyne in Co Cork has been sent forward for trial at the Circuit Criminal Court on charges of indecently assaulting two teenage girls in the 1980s.

Father Dan Duane, aged 72, of the Presbytery, Cecilstown, Mallow, Co. Cork, was served with the book of evidence in the case at the District Court in Mallow this morning.

He was charged with indecently assaulting the two women in the Mallow area on dates between 1 September 1980 and 1 April 1982.

Fr Duane was arrested and charged in February.

He was granted free legal aid today and was released on continuing bail.

The Silence

2011-04-05T07:55:00.000-07:00

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/the-silence/?utm_campaign=homepage&utm_medium=proglist&utm_source=proglist

The SilenceOn air and online
April 19, 2011 at 9:00pmSUPPORT PROVIDED BY
PRESS RELEASE

FRONTLINE examines a little-known chapter of the Catholic Church sex abuse story -- decades of abuse of Native Americans by priests and other church workers in Alaska. Through candid interviews with survivors, this FRONTLINE report focuses on the abuse by a number of men who worked for the Church along Alaska's far west coast in the late 1960s and early 1970s. All told, they would leave behind a trail of hundreds of claims of abuse, making this one of the hardest hit regions in the country. As part of FRONTLINE's new magazine program, The Silence airs as the second segment on Tuesday, April 19, 2011, at 9 P.M. ET on PBS.

The Silence is a co-presentation with Native American Public Telecommunications (NAPT).

Press Release
FRONTLINE INVESTIGATES CHURCH SEX ABUSE IN ALASKA
The Silence
Segment 2 of FRONTLINE's new multistory magazine hour
Tuesday, April 19, 2011, at 9 P.M. ET on PBS

www.facebook.com/frontlinepbs
Twitter: @frontlinepbs

FRONTLINE reveals a little-known chapter of the Catholic Church sex abuse story: decades of abuse of Native Americans by priests and other church workers in Alaska.

In The Silence, the second of two magazine segments airing Tuesday, April 19, 2011, at 9 P.M. ET on PBS, FRONTLINE producer Tom Curran and reporter Mark Trahant examine the legacy of abuse by a number of men who worked for the Catholic Church along Alaska's far west coast in the late 1960s and early 1970s. They would leave behind a trail of hundreds of claims of abuse, making this one of the hardest hit regions in the country.

"I was just a kid," Ben Andrews tells FRONTLINE of the years of abuse he suffered at the hands of Father George Endal and Joseph Lundowski, a layman who was training to be a deacon. "Father Endal and Joseph Lundowski, they couldn't stop molesting me once they started. It was almost an everyday thing. Father Endal kept telling me that it would make me closer to God."

"I'm still having nightmares of Joseph Lundowski molesting, having sex with me," says Peter "Packy" Kobuk. "I get up sweating, angry, feel like I could hurt somebody, but I never meaned [sic] to get angry at my children, but the anger went on my children also."

"This was 1970," says Anchorage attorney Ken Roosa, who represented the Alaska victims against the church. "It was absolutely unthinkable that the Catholic Church could be involved in the sexual abuse of children. There was nowhere for the kids to hide. There was no one they could talk to. The adults believed the abusers over their own children. It was a perfect storm for molestation."

As part of the recent church settlement with the victims, the bishop of Fairbanks, Donald Kettler, was asked to do something that no other bishop in the country had done: return to all of the villages where the abuse occurred and apologize to the victims in person. In December 2010, FRONTLINE gained unique access to Bishop Kettler's visit to the village of St. Michael -- frequently referred to as "ground zero" for the abuse -- where the bishop would come face-to-face with the reality of the abuse that the church had refused to acknowledge for years.

"In St. Michael, we've had a great deal of our sexual abuse happen there," Bishop Kettler tells FRONTLINE. "So I am certainly conscious of the importance of this visit. I'm anxious insofar as I'm wondering how I will be received. What will happen? What I can do?"

In the days before the bishop arrives, Elsie Boudreau, one of the first Alaska survivors to file suit against the church, says: "I've seen how important it would be to have someone from the church say they're sorry. The bishop has that power to reach that little kid and say, 'It wasn't your fault; you did nothing wrong.' And I don't know if he's able to do that."

The Silence is a Lower 48 Films production for WGBH/FRONTLINE and Native American Public Telecommunications (NAPT). The writer and producer is Tom Curran. The reporter is Mark Trahant. The executive producer for NAPT is Shirley K. Sneve. The series senior producer of FRONTLINE is Raney Aronson-Rath. The executive producer of FRONTLINE is David Fanning.

FRONTLINE is produced by WGBH Boston and is broadcast nationwide on PBS. Funding for FRONTLINE is provided through the support of PBS viewers and by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. Major funding for FRONTLINE is provided by The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation and by Reva and David Logan. Additional funding is provided by the Park Foundation and by the FRONTLINE Journalism Fund. Additional funding for FRONTLINE's expanded broadcast season is provided by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. FRONTLINE is closed-captioned for deaf and hard-of-hearing viewers by the Media Access Group at WGBH. FRONTLINE is a registered trademark of the WGBH Educational Foundation.

Read more: http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/the-silence/?utm_campaign=homepage&utm_medium=proglist&utm_source=proglist#ixzz1If1p37YE

Cover-up

2011-04-05T07:49:00.001-07:00

http://www.allvoices.com/contributed-news/8682989-chileans-believe-that-the-catholic-church-covers-up-sexual-abuse
Chileans believe that the Catholic Church covers up sexual abuseSantiago : Chile | Apr 04, 2011 By faraway 1
0 Views: 40

Rate This PostToo Brief No Substance Poor Grammar & Spelling A survey conducted by the Chilean press pointed out that 88% of Chileans believe that the Catholic Church hid information about alleged sexual abuse by priests.

The survey, sponsored by the newspaper "La Tercera", also indicates that 74% of citizens believe that the Vatican did not respond adequately to complaints of abuses attributed to priests.

The assessment comes after Father Fernando Karadimas, one of the most influential of Chile in the 1980s, became responsible for seven complaints of sexual abuse and bribery of witnesses.

Karadimas denies the charges. He drove the Union of Priests of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, whose goal is "to form a spiritual bond in prayer and charity among the members. "

The survey reveals that only 10% of respondents believe that the Church did not attempt to hide cases.

The auxiliary bishop of Santiago, Cristian Contreras admitted that the Church's credibility is low and added that recognize these facts is a first element to come out "of the crisis.

Contreras declined to comment on statements by Cardinal Jorge Medina, who said, referring to the complainants of abuse allegedly committed by Karadimas, a 17 year old knows what he does.

The research, which has a confidence level of 95%, also questioned the Church's image for the Chileans. In this context, 24% of respondents classified as good, 32% as regular, and 21% as bad.

Furthermore, 59% of people believe that the Catholic Church has worsened over the years and 80% said confidence in the institution declined.

The AssemblyThe Assembly of Bishops of Chile, which begins on Monday, will discuss this topic

Church opposes extension of Statute of limitations

2011-04-05T07:40:00.000-07:00

http://www.wtnh.com/dpp/news/politics/catholic-church-opposes-statute-change
Catholic Church opposes statute change
Updated: Monday, 04 Apr 2011, 7:27 PM EDT
Published : Monday, 04 Apr 2011, 5:51 PM EDT

By: Mark Davis
Hartford, Conn (WTNH) - The Catholic Church in Connecticut has been given very high grades for its response to child abuse within its institutions, but some believe it is continuing its battle against adults who were abused long ago.

The trial for the first of some 90 plaintiffs in the lawsuits against Saint Francis Hospital begin this month. The plaintiffs are victims of the late Doctor George Reardon, who was abusing children for decades while he was working there.

"The goal of this bill is to recognize the heinous nature of crimes against children. Those are the crimes of child sexual abuse, by removing the statute of limitations going forward," said State Senator Beth Bye (D-West Hartford).

Last year the Catholic Church managed to kill a bill that would have removed the statute of limitations retroactively. The statute of limitations expires 30 years after you reach your 18th birthday, but the church is still fighting against the revised bill.

"We clearly had a problem with the retroactiveness of last year's bill. We appreciate the prospectiveness of this bill, but that still is one of a number of issues," Michael Culhane from the Connecticut Catholic Conference said.

Brian Hotchkiss of Branford, is not part of the Reardon case, but says being able to take his child abuser to court, years after the fact, helped him recover.

"My recovery moved forward. I was able to see that I do have more courage. I was able to leave behind the stigma of what had happened to me when I was a child," Hotchkiss said.

But the church has introduced its own bill, that would make public entities, like cities, towns, and the state, open to similar law suits, saying that would only be fair.

"As it relates to this particular heinous crime, we think that the protection of all children are just what the issue is all about," Culhane said.

The Judiciary Committee is expected to vote on both of these proposals sometime within the next two weeks.

Verger accused

2011-04-05T07:30:00.000-07:00

http://www.journallive.co.uk/north-east-news/todays-news/2011/04/05/newcastle-church-official-in-court-for-sex-charges-61634-28458992/

Newcastle church official in court for sex charges
by Rob Pattinson, The Journal
Apr 5 2011
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Colin James Adams verger at Newcastle's St Nicholas CathedralONE of the region's top church officials singled out a young altar server for sexual abuse, a court heard yesterday.

Colin James Adams, verger at Newcastle’s St Nicholas Cathedral, was married with three young children and living in a tied church cottage in Wales at the time offences are said to have been committed in the 1990s.

When he was arrested in January 2010 and questioned about the claims, he said he had been a mentor to the boy and denied there had ever been any sexual activity between them.

In a trial expected to last a week, at Cardiff Crown Court, the 58-year-old has pleaded not guilty to seven charges of indecent assault and one of buggery.

Susan Ferrier, prosecuting, told the court: “The boy was young and vulnerable and Colin James Adams spotted him and targeted him.

“He encouraged the teenager to spend time with him, took him on trips and forged a close relationship with him. It was manipulation and grooming of a young lad so that he could be used sexually.”

Ms Ferrier said the alleged victim had lived with his dreadful memories for years before finally finding the courage to make a complaint to the police.

“In cases of this nature that is not unusual,” she told the jury.

“It is embarrassing to have to talk about such matters.”

Adams was working for the Llandaff diocese at the time of the alleged offences, which the court heard had taken him to other churches outside Cardiff.

Read More http://www.journallive.co.uk/north-east-news/todays-news/2011/04/05/newcastle-church-official-in-court-for-sex-charges-61634-28458992/#ixzz1Iev23i9T

What happened to "zero tolerance"?

2011-04-05T02:50:00.000-07:00

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/02/opinion/02sat3.html?_r=2
What Happened to ‘Zero Tolerance’?Published: April 1, 2011
. A meeting of the nation’s Roman Catholic bishops is scheduled for June. It needs to repair the gaping holes uncovered in their “zero tolerance” mandate for priests suspected of sexually abusing children.

Related
Times Topic: Roman Catholic Church Sex Abuse CasesA grand jury report in February found that the Philadelphia archdiocese, for all its announced safeguards, allowed 37 suspect priests to remain in parish work. The indictment of a layman and four church figures — including a monsignor accused of covering up abuse — is proof that the bishops’ system of local and national review boards isn’t strong enough.

Board appointees are supposedly equipped to scrutinize each diocese’s adherence to zero tolerance. But the grand jury in Philadelphia found that the hierarchy there continued to protect accused priests despite repeated scandals and vows for reform.

The leader of the Philadelphia review board pointed to one major weakness: currently, any allegations about rogue priests are first vetted by chancery officials working for the archdiocese. They rightly should go directly to the review boards. This should be a universal no-brainer, along with stronger outside auditing of safeguard programs. Both were initially required, but the bishops subsequently eased that to a policy of “self-reporting” with audits every three years.

The haunting question is how many other Philadelphias may be out there.

A church review panel of laypeople formed in 2002 looked beyond zero tolerance for priests and warned that “there must be consequences” for bishops who engineered cover-ups. More than 700 priests had to be dismissed in a three-year period. But there has been nothing close to an accounting of bishops’ culpability in protecting predatory priests and paying hush money to contain complaints. This is a fact for the bishops to ponder at their June meeting alongside the shocking grand jury report.

Accused priest gets pension

2011-04-05T02:33:00.000-07:00

http://www.cphpost.dk/news/national/88-national/51371-priest-accused-of-sex-abuse-gets-pension.html
Priest accused of sex abuse gets pension
Monday, 04 April 2011 21:16 JB News .Catholic Church quietly closes sexual abuse case and retires priest with pension; priest’s accusers furious

The priest's accusers accused the church of cowardice for giving the benefit of the doubt to the retired priest (Photo: Colourbox)
The Catholic Church of Denmark is being criticised for secrecy and inaction in its handling of the cases of several priests accused of sexual abuse against young men.

The complaints follow the announcement by the church on Sunday that it had completed its last and most extensive investigation into the case of a priest who was suspended in April 2010 after being accused by five separate people of indecent exposure and sexual abuse.

In a brief statement the church announced that the official investigation into the complaints had been completed and that the priest would retire with pension as a result.

The church declined to reveal what its investigation into the complaints uncovered or why the priest retired.

“Our conclusion is that the case is closed and the suspension is lifted. The priest then asked if he could retire,” church spokesman Rev Niels Engelbrecht told Berlingske newspaper.

The bishop of the Diocese of Copenhagen, Czeslaw Kozon, however wrote in a letter to the people who filed the complaint against the priest that the church had not been able to determine whether the complaints were founded, and therefore chose to give the priest the benefit of the doubt.
Frederik Roed, one of the men who accused the priest of sexual misconduct, was angered by the church’s conclusion.

“I am deeply shocked that the Catholic bishop is choosing to close and conceal the case after five people, independently of one another, complained about the priest.”

He accused the church of cowardice by “letting the priest sneak off into retirement”.

“Doing so lets them avoid having to take up a fight and hold the priest accountable,” Roed said.

See related stories
Catholic Church to investigate priests for sexual assault

Church remained silent about child porn conviction

Civil suit

2011-04-05T02:27:00.000-07:00

http://blogs.riverfronttimes.com/dailyrft/2011/04/donald_mcguire_priest_abuse_missouri.php
Donald McGuire: Abusive Priest Had Local Connection "Examining" Boy in St. CharlesBy Chad Garrison, Mon., Apr. 4 2011 @ 2:53PM Comments (3) Categories: Gettin' All Religious Up in Here, News, See You in Court!
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Fr. Donald McGuire
A civil suit filed last week in Chicago captured headlines across the nation and brought up more allegations of sexual abuse within the Catholic Church, including an incident occurring in Missouri in 1999.

Eighty-year-old Father Donald McGuire, a popular camp director and former spiritual adviser to Mother Theresa, has been serving a 25-year federal sentence since 2008 on charges of molesting minors over a period spanning four decades. The civil suit filed last Monday includes 65 new documents that plaintiff attorneys believe will show that Jesuit officials in Chicago ignored and kept hidden McGuire's sexual abuse despite dozens of warnings about the priest.

One incident involving McGuire occurred in the summer of 1999 when McGuire allegedly brought a 13-year-old boy with him to St. Charles while recovering from hip surgery. Below is part of an affidavit from a Homeland Security Officer investigating that incident.

Warning: It gets pretty strange.

Victim A stated that one of the early trips was to Missouri, where McGUIRE, Victim A, and some others stayed at the home of a physician who was treating McGUIRE after a surgery. While in Missouri, McGUIRE required Victim A to participate in a "general confession," covering his entire life up to that point.

During Victim A's confession, Victim A stated that he had engaged in masturbation. McGUIRE asked Victim A if he had done any harm to himself, and told Victim A that McGUIRE would have to inspect Victim A's penis in order to determine whether Victim A had harmed himself.

After the confession, McGUIRE took Victim A to McGUIRE's room and locked the door. McGUIRE had Victim A remove Victim A's clothes. McGUIRE told Victim A words to the effect of, he had "developed nicely," and used a magnifying glass to examine Victim A's penis. McGUIRE then sprayed the inside of Victim A's penis with baby oil, telling Victim A that this was so that McGUIRE could better tell if there had been any "damage" from the masturbation.

Victim A stated that after what happened in Missouri, McGUIRE's sexual abuse
continued to escalate. Over time, the sexual abuse included discussion of sexual topics, McGUIRE's purchasing and showing various forms of pornography to Victim A, McGUIRE's "massages" of Victim A's body and genitalia with various oils, McGUIRE's requiring Victim A to "massage" McGUIRE's body and genitalia with various oils, McGUIRE's requiring Victim A to shower with McGUIRE, McGUIRE's digital penetration of Victim A's anus, and McGUIRE's performing oral sex on Victim A. Victim A stated that McGUIRE engaged in some combination of these activities with Victim A practically every night between approximately May or June 1999 and August 2003, when the two were together.

The affidavit continues that after many years of allowing McGuire to stay in his home, the Missouri physician asked him to leave "primarily because he believed that McGUIRE was exercising inappropriate control over Victim A."

Read the entire affidavit here and more about McGuire at the site Bishop Accountability.

Coach pleads guilty

2011-04-05T02:13:00.000-07:00

http://www.boston.com/news/local/breaking_news/2011/04/former_new_york.html
Former New York coach pleads guilty to 1970s sex assault in Boston
E-mail | Print Posted by Martin Finucane April 4, 2011 02:18 PM
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By Michael Rezendes and Scott Allen, Globe Staff

A former high-profile New York City basketball coach was convicted this morning of molesting a teenager while visiting Boston in the 1970s, under a plea deal that will allow him to avoid jail time.

Josh Reynolds for The Boston Globe

Robert Oliva

Robert Oliva, who resigned as basketball coach at Christ the King Regional High School after the abuse allegations surfaced last year, could have faced two life sentences, if convicted of two counts of rape of a child. However, under an agreement with Suffolk District Attorney Daniel F. Conley, Oliva pled guilty to rape as well as disseminating pornography in exchange for five years of probation, which he will serve while wearing a monitoring device on his ankle.

Oliva also agreed to never coach children again.

"I lost my childhood to Bob Oliva," said tearful victim Jimmy Carlino in a dramatic victim impact statement to Suffolk Superior Judge Carol S. Ball. Carlino has said he was molested more than 100 times by Oliva in several Northeastern states in the 1970s when Carlino was a teenager growing up in the Ozone Park section of Queens.

Carlino's attorney, Mitchell Garabedian, said today that he has filed a $20 million civil lawsuit in New York against Oliva, the Catholic diocese that oversees Christ the King Regional High School, as well as several other Catholic organizations. He said he wanted to know whether there had been sexual abuse complaints against Oliva that went unheeded.

The New York statute of limitations - the period after a crime during which prosecutors may file charges - for Oliva's alleged crimes expired long ago. But Conley's office was able to present evidence regarding sexual abuse that occurred in 1976 while Carlino -- then 14 -- and Oliva were in Boston to see a Red Sox-Yankees doubleheader. That's because the time limit on filing charges in Massachusetts stopped when Oliva left Massachusetts and returned to New York.

Carlino accepted the plea agreement, but one of the key witnesses in the case said Oliva belongs behind bars.

"Regardless of how long ago the deviant crime committed by Oliva was committed, and regardless that Oliva lives out of the state of Massachusetts, this plea deal is too lenient for the admitted sex offender Oliva," wrote Sam Albano to Judge Ball. "Oliva has continued his deviant ways as a sexual predator on young men, since this particular incident in 1976 and if not incarcerated will continue to be a threat to society." Albano was a former friend of Oliva who testified against him before the grand jury that indicted him.

Assistant District Attorney Leora Joseph said the plea deal achieved the district attorney's major goal, protecting children from abuse. Under the deal, Oliva cannot coach any longer and he will have to wear a monitoring device to track his movements while he's on probation. Oliva will serve his sentence in South Carolina where he now resides.

Assets to be seized

2011-04-05T02:05:00.000-07:00

http://www.irishcentral.com/news/Irish-State-to-seize-religious-orders-property-to-pay-victims-comp-119170859.html
Irish State to seize religious order’s property to pay victim’s comp
Over $300 million in assets to be seized from church
By CATHAL DERVAN, IrishCentral.com Staff Writer

Published Monday, April 4, 2011, 7:23 AMUpdated Monday, April 4, 2011, 7:23 AM

Irish Education Minister Ruairi Quinn

Read more: US survivors plan to sue Archdiocese of Dublin and pedophile treatment center over clerical abuse

Read more: Irish Minister says religion in schools is a waste of class time

Irish religious orders will have property worth over $300million seized by the State to foot the bill for compensation for the victims of sexual abuse.

New Minister for Education Ruairi Quinn has revealed that he will seize land and property from 18 religious orders to honor their financial commitments to victims of residential institutional abuse.

Quinn is to force religious orders to hand schools over to the Department of Education to meet the shortfall of over $300 million due from the 18 orders named in the Ryan Report.

The congregations had agreed to pay €476million as their half of the compensation due to victims which included €128million paid over in 2002.

The Sunday Times reports that of the new funds promised last year by the religious orders, only $35 million has been paid over.

“The religious orders owe us money,” Quinn told the Sunday Times.

“They have promised us some of the costs but they are still shy a couple of hundred million Euro.

“The deal that was originally done with the government was meant to be a 50-50 split of the €1.36billion bill. They are way short of that.

“They have no money but they have assets and I want the Irish taxpayer to get those assets. I want legal ownership of their schools.”

Quinn is to seek meetings with the 18 religious orders to facilitate the transfer of school buildings to the Department of Education but will leave the congregations in charge of the schools.

The Minister added: “I will meet with those religious orders who own substantial chunks of school educational property and I will be looking for the legal transfer of the ownership of their educational structure to the Department of Education and Skills.

“This will be done at no cost in return for equalizing the debt that is due to the state and the taxpayer.

“I am not trying to bankrupt them. I am simply saying to them that I know they don’t have cash but they have assets and to sign over their ownership of those assets to the State.”

Read more: US survivors plan to sue Archdiocese of Dublin and pedophile treatment center over clerical abuse

Read more: Irish Minister says religion in schools is a waste of class time

Victim

2011-04-05T01:59:00.000-07:00

http://www.pennlive.com/midstate/index.ssf/2011/04/waiting_to_be_counted_one_mans.html
'Waiting to be counted': One man's story of sexual abuse at the hands of a priest
Published: Monday, April 04, 2011, 12:03 PM
By IVEY DEJESUS, The Patriot-News The Patriot-News

Print A boy is molested by his priest, the transgressions committed in the church rectory and in a car.

Inappropriate touching leads to depraved acts, and the boy, consumed by fear and confusion, tells no one.

Todd Frey says that happened to him in 1982, when he was 13.

View full sizeAnn Foster, The Patriot-NewsTodd Frey talks about his molestation by a Catholic priest when he was in his early teens.
The years have muddied the adolescent memories, but Frey sets them straight with the help of letters from the Roman Catholic Diocese of Harrisburg. The letters are for him as much affirmation that what happened to him was devastating as it was illegal.

In April 1996, then-Bishop Nicholas C. Dattilo wrote to Frey to say: “The life of a bishop has many joys and many sorrows. The most profound of sorrows is for a bishop to discover that one of the priests of his diocese has betrayed his office by sexual misconduct.”

No criminal charges were ever leveled on Guy Marsico, a former priest assigned to St. Leo the Great Catholic Church in Rohrerstown, Lancaster County.

“I’m still struggling with this issue to this day,” said Frey, who lives in Lancaster County.

Now 42, Frey clings to assurances from his mother. Years of therapy have done little to ease his torment.

“I’m still stuck in the anger mode,” he said. “As a man, I should be able to say that happens, get over it. But I can’t.”

Frey puts a human face to the sexual abuse scandal engulfing the Roman Catholic Church, its latest epicenter the Archdiocese of Philadelphia, which has suspended 23 priests pending investigation into a grand jury report that, over the course of decades, they molested countless minors.

A high-ranking church official also was indicted, charged with covering up years of abuse, the first time that has happened in the U.S.

Over the past two decades, the Catholic Church has paid out billions of dollars in settlements in the scandal — considered the Vatican’s worst crisis since the Reformation — involving parishes in Boston, Chicago, Los Angeles and others worldwide. Few priests have been criminally charged. The majority have faced civil suits.

Indeed, Frey’s story underscores the dilemma faced by clergy abuse victims in this country: For many, statutes of limitation have simply expired.

Frey and his family reported the abuse allegations to the Harrisburg Diocese in 1994, when he was 25. By then, the statute of limitations had expired. At the time, state law required allegations to be reported within five years after turning 18.

“The problem with Frey is everything happened in the ‘80s,” said Sean McCormack, chief deputy district attorney in the Dauphin County District Attorney’s Office.

Tormented for years, Frey last June contacted Dauphin County District Attorney Ed Marsico’s office. The Marsicos are not related.

Diocesan spokesman Joe Aponick said the church, back in 1994, launched an immediate investigation and removed Guy Marsico from the priesthood. The church also paid for Frey’s counseling and medication, and remains willing to work with Frey.

Under the current statute of limitation, sexual abuse victims who were minors when they were assaulted have legal recourse up to the age of 50.

Statutes of limitations, once expired, cannot be re-applied even if the Legislature extends the statute.

“One of the sad things with these abuse situations is everybody is affected differently,” said McCormack, head of the child abuse unit. “It can be a lifetime. It can affect someone for life.”

Guy Marsico now works as a midstate travel agent. The Patriot-News spoke with Guy Marsico for this story, but he declined to comment.

Morally wrong

As a fourth-grader at St. Leo the Great, Todd Frey was a timid boy who often fended off bullying from classmates. He aspired to become a priest and found an ally in Father Guy, a popular confessor and wedding celebrant.

The priest forged a special bond with the boy, and when he was transferred to St. Rose of Lima in York, he invited the boy to spend the weekend at his new parish.

Only Frey provides an account of what he said happened that night — and again several other times. But his words bear weight against the letters the diocese sent him in the wake of their investigation into his allegations.

The letters from the diocese lack details, but they acknowledge that what happened to him was a “source of pain and anguish.” A letter from the Rev. Paul C. Helwig, then-secretary for clergy and religious life, mentions Marsico by name and the investigation that eventually led to his dismissal from the ministry.

“The diocese presented your report to the priest and, after appropriate inquiry, he was relieved of his duties. He is no longer active in priestly ministry,” the letter states.

In a letter, Datillo acknowledged his profound sorrows at learning that one of his priests had betrayed his office by sexual misconduct.

Frey said that, on that night at St. Rose of Lima, after Mass and dinner, the priest led the boy to his rectory bedroom. The room had two beds, but one was covered in boxes. The priest told the boy he could sleep with him. The boy asked if he could have his own bed.

“He said, ‘No. You will sleep with me,’” Frey said.

The priest ordered the boy to bed, then began to fondle the boy, Frey said. Eventually, the priest made the boy fondle him, Frey said.

“He gradually pulled his hands towards his crotch and he put his hands on my crotch,” Frey said.

The boy was confused and frightened.

“He orally manipulated me,” Frey said. “His mouth went down to my crotch area. I should’ve jumped out of bed and gone to the police ... but did not. I felt I was under his control.”

Frey said he passed out and to this day believes the priest drugged him.

After that, the priest began to take the boy on drives, sometimes to nearby places, other times to out-of-state parishes. Frey said Marsico liked to drive around York County, pointing out adult bookstores and bars.

“He’d touch my legs all the time,” he said. “And he would tell off-color jokes. Jokes a priest shouldn’t tell.”

Frey was 16, a student at Lancaster Catholic High School, when he said he told his mother of the abuse. By then, he was failing classes and using drugs. His mother didn’t know what to do and did not call police.

“That’s how things were done back then,” she said. “We knew it was morally wrong, but didn’t know it was legally wrong. There wasn’t anything you could do. You didn’t go to police. You went to the diocese.”

The clergy sex abuse scandal has confirmed what once seemed preposterous to her. But she says she never doubted her son.

“It was such a different time,” she said. “In our lives, the priest was above people.”

At 18, Frey entered a drug rehabilitation center.

Relieved of duties

In 1994, 12 years after the alleged abuse happened, Frey and his parents contacted the Harrisburg Diocese. The diocese launched an immediate investigation.

That August, the family received a letter written on plain paper and dated Aug. 8, 1994:

“I write to you with deepest regret. My words may not be many, but they are heartfelt. ... no words could ever begin to express how sorry I am for having hurt you —— all of you ... I’m a very different person today ... I pray that God will bring you healing. I also pray that with time and His help, He might move you to forgive me. If you were able to look into my heart and soul you would see how regretful I am...”

The letter had no return address and was signed simply: Guy.

The diocese says it has no knowledge of this letter. Frey said he has little doubt the letter was written by his former priest.

A few months later, Helwig wrote a two-page letter to Frey informing him that Marsico had been relieved of his church duties and acknowledging “a pastoral responsibility to assist you in working toward recovery and healing.”

The diocese had arranged for Marsico to pay for Frey’s therapy and medication, Helwig wrote. But Frey’s request for financial compensation — $975,000, a sum he calculated would cover pain and suffering, loss of wages and the educational expenses incurred by his parents — raised serious questions, Helwig wrote.

“Since prior to your report the diocese was not aware of any problems the priest may have had, it was determined that the diocese cannot be responsible for the actions of a priest which are performed for his own ends and which are condemned rather than approved by the Church,” Helwig wrote.

Dattilo was not “at liberty to disburse diocesan funds in cases like this where there is no legal responsibility on the part of the Church,” he wrote. “These funds were contributed by the people of the diocese for the ministries of the Church.”

The diocese had no knowledge of the sexual abuse at the time and, therefore, bore “no legal responsibility for his actions and consequently has no legal obligation to provide financial compensation,” wrote Dattilo, who passed away in 2004.

The church’s Victim Assistance Program tends to the “real needs” of victims, ranging from tuition, therapy and aid for the family, Aponick said. Financial compensation is typically connected to a cost incurred by the victim.

“I trust Bishop Dattilo made the right ministerial judgment on it,” Aponick said.

Aponick said the Diocese eventually lost contact with Frey.

McCormack believes that the Harrisburg Diocese is diligent about contacting law enforcement authorities any time it receives abuse allegations.

“I think they’ve been out in front of this issue more so than many other places in the country,” said McCormack, who has headed the child abuse unit since 1995.

In 2004, Dattilo reported that the Harrisburg Diocese paid out $1.9 million from 1950 through 2002 in connection with 35 credible allegations of sexual abuse of minors against 22 priests, according to BishopAccountability.org, a Massachusetts-based online watchdog.

Aponick said in most allegations, the priest has been dead for years.

‘A tremendous betrayal’

Jason Berry, an award-winning writer on the clergy sex abuse scandal, counts Frey among the thousands of “walking wounded.”

“Even though many people tend to be knee-jerk cynical about the culture of victimization, the reality is that there are many people whose lives have been thwarted, harmed, in some cases, deeply damaged,” said Berry, whose latest book, “Render unto Rome: The Secret Life of Money in the Catholic Church,” was released last summer. “If there were a fair mechanism by which they could get compensation, it would help them at least get on their feet or have a shot at a happier existence.”

Berry has heard countless victims talk about the trauma of the abuse.

“It’s a very humbling experience,” Berry said. “Most abuse survivors feel a tremendous betrayal, not just from the priest but the church hierarchy. It has a searing affect on their spiritual life. The notion that somehow faith itself abandoned them.”

Barbara Blaine, the president of Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, an influential advocacy group for victims of clerical sexual abuse, said the diocese’s refusal to award Frey the $975,000 smacks of insensitivity and loopholes.

“It shows a disregard for the pain and suffering of victims,” said Blaine.

In 1995, Blaine received an $80,000 out-of-court settlement from the Toledo, Ohio diocese after she threatened legal action against the diocese and a priest, she said, sexually abused her for years.

“For a bishop to claim they can’t help because they didn’t know about it is ludicrous and it’s insensitive,” said Blaine, pointing out that Pope Benedict has urged the Catholic church “to do all it can to help victims.”

Bishop Joseph McFadden, who took over the Harrisburg Diocese last summer, said he has reached out to Frey, inviting him to visit and talk, and explore spiritual healing.

McFadden said that throwing money at an injury isn’t going to help victims heal.

“For some people it may be easy to say, ‘Here just take $50,000 and tell them to go away.’ That’s not a proper response for a church,” he said. “The church needs to embrace victims and try to help them put their life back together the best they can. We can’t put it back together perfectly because something has been stolen that cannot be replaced. But I would suggest that the idea that money somehow replaces that, money does not. What replaces it really is care, concern, compassion for the victims, a willingness to hold them and walk the journey with them.”

Blaine said recovery from clergy sex abuse is difficult. Victims commonly abuse drugs and alcohol, or have eating disorders. Many remain marginalized, unable to maintain jobs and relationships.

“We have difficulty with intimacy — that means sexual relationships, but even ordinary relationships,” she said. “Many have strained relationships with family members.”

An issue of trust

Todd Frey’s mother is exhausted with the past.

“It doesn’t mean it’s not important,” she said. “But it’s been 25 years. It’s old. I’m tired of it. It’s disgusting. It’s so aged, I wish it would disappear.”

She has left the Catholic Church.

Frey has been baptized a Mennonite. He struggles to have healthy relationships and has never married nor been in a long-term relationship.

“I don’t trust people. I have a tremendous trust issue,” said Frey, who joined SNAP a few months ago.

He keeps envelopes and folders filled with copies of letters from attorneys and details of interactions over the years with the Harrisburg Diocese.

“I’m looking for validation,” Frey said. “I have people say, ‘Move on.’ I haven’t. I’m still waiting to be counted.”

More victims

2011-04-03T10:46:00.001-07:00

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/nunavut/the-trials-of-nunavut-lament-for-an-arctic-nation/article1963420/
Crime has doubled in Nunavut since the territory was founded 12 years ago this week, raising a critical question: Is Nunavut a failure of Canadian nation building? And if so, what must be done for history’s scars to heal?

Part I
Inside the dead man's house, Elisapee Qaumagiaq fell silent. She let the walls speak for her.

The Trials of Nunavut Special Report
Take a rich, multimedia tour of Nunavut and its struggle with violence
Photos
Portraits of Nunavut
Wednesday
Live chat: Is Nunavut a failure of Canadian nation building? Someone had plunged his knuckles through the hallway drywall again and again and again, from the kitchen all the way down to the bedrooms. The blood had been washed away, but the tale of murder, outlined in felt-pen evidence markings, swirled beneath Ms. Qaumagiaq's snow boots.

She looked around for a few moments before saying the place was giving her “the creeps” and heading outside for a smoke in the minus-10-degree gale strafing the shores of Tellik Inlet. Ms. Qaumagiaq was with Cape Dorset's housing agency. She was responsible for getting the place back in shape, to help answer the never-ending shortage of shelter in the area. But, with so many scenes of death in recent months, the task was weighing on her.

“He was a good kid,” she said of the young man who lived there until he was shot last September. “Just a little angry.”

His death began a run of gun violence that terrorized Cape Dorset, the 1,300-person hamlet and famed sculpture and printmaking centre nuzzled against the Precambrian cliffs of tiny Dorset Island, just off the southwestern coast of Baffin Island. Around here, the events are simply referred to as “the Incidents,” if they're mentioned at all.

On the night of Sept. 19, a Sunday, a Grade 11 student named Peter Kingwatsiak allegedly crept into his uncle's bedroom and tried to stab the older man in the head while he slept, then fled after his uncle awoke. According to police, the teen then grabbed a gun, walked into his stepbrother's home and opened fire on the slumbering young man. Mappaluk Adla, or Mupp as he was known among friends at the youth centre, crawled for help, but never made it past the front door. He was eight days short of his 23rd birthday. The next day, schools were locked down until police picked up his accused killer around lunchtime.

Three weeks later, on Oct. 10, a 19-year-old man named Elee Geetah allegedly shot dead his brother, Jamesie Simigak, in a dispute over an iPod. He then barricaded himself inside a house and came out only after the RCMP flew in an emergency-response team from Iqaluit.

Finally, three days later, two Grade 9 boys sprayed the town with gunfire and traded shots with the police. One bullet flew through a constable's front window and embedded in his bathtub. His wife and two daughters were away at the time, but afterward the entire family left Cape Dorset, never to return.

The police and local media talked of a town unravelling, of a place where social norms had collapsed. What no one said aloud was that the unhinged town was symptomatic of an unhinged territory. While Canadians were aware there were social problems in the North, the outbreak of mayhem in Cape Dorset last fall drew broad attention for the first time to their violent extremes – the toll Nunavut pays in cold blood.

The rate of violent crime per capita here is seven times what it is in the rest of Canada. The homicide rate is around 1,000 per cent of the Canadian average. And the number of crimes reported to the police have more than doubled in the dozen years since the territory was formed. If it were an independent country, Nunavut's crime statistics would place it in the realm of South Africa or Mexico.

Even more than Nunavummiut harming each other, they are hurting themselves: Inuit males aged 15 to 24 have a suicide rate 40 times that of their peers in the rest of Canada, and children are abused at a rate 10 times the national average, even as 50 per cent of social-worker positions stand vacant.

Victim's suicide

2011-04-03T10:38:00.000-07:00

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/nunavut/editors-note/article1968641/
Editor's note
Globe and Mail Update
Published Saturday, Apr. 02, 2011 8:53PM EDT
Last updated Saturday, Apr. 02, 2011 9:11PM EDT
0 comments Email Print/License Decrease text size
Increase text size A little over four months ago, Leo Nangmalik graciously welcomed a reporter and photographer from The Globe and Mail into his home to share his story.

Mr. Nangmalik lived 6 kilometres outside of Repulse Bay, a small hamlet in Nunavut on the edge of the Arctic circle, in a modest dwelling patched together with items from a nearby landfill.

More related to this story
•The trials of Nunavut: Lament for an Arctic nation
He recounted, tearfully, the sexual abuse he suffered as a young boy in a Catholic school. He bravely agreed to discuss his life, pockmarked as it was by drug-dealing and stints in jail. And he spoke of the need for his community to grieve, of the comfort he had gained by attending local healing services, and of how Nunavut's future will be determined by how honestly it confronts its past.

Shortly after this piece was published, The Globe and Mail learned that Mr. Nangmalik had tragically taken his own life. He was 50.

Malta

2011-04-03T06:44:00.000-07:00

http://www.independent.com.mt/news.asp?newsitemid=122937
Church still to give its account to God and the people – Lawrence Grech
by Annaliza Borg

The first anniversary of Pope Benedict XVI’s visit to Malta will be marked in two weeks’ time, yet Lawrence Grech, one of a number of alleged victims of abuse by priests who grew up at St Joseph Home in Santa Venera, said that no progress towards any form of reconciliation has since been made by the Church.

The fact that up until last Monday (the last time the alleged victims came face-to-face with them at court) the priests were still wearing clerical garb is very disturbing for the alleged victims, who want the ugly chapter in their lives closed once and for all.

“The church cannot remain silent for any longer and must give its account to God and to the people,” Mr Grech told The Malta Independent on Sunday earlier this week.

He considers the church’s failure to act means it is also part of the abuse. “It is an accomplice,” he said, “What is the point of protecting these people?”, pointing out that even the public at large is awaiting the outcome.

On 27 January, seven of the alleged victims addressed an urgent appeal to Pope Benedict XVI, asking that the priests accused of abusing them be dealt with by the clerical authorities.

They complained that they remained in the dark as to whether it is the Archdiocese of Malta or the Vatican that is to have the final say on the priests’ future as far as their clerical standing is concerned. Three months later, nothing has changed, Mr Grech pointed out.

“The church had promised to establish a tribunal and close the case within a few months but there have been no developments,” he explained, his disappointment obvious.

Mgr Charles Scicluna − the Promoter of Justice in the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith at the Vatican − concluded his investigations in September and sent his findings to the Archdiocese. In the meantime, the Archdiocese’s response team had investigated the allegations and, helped by Mgr Scicluna’s findings, had reached the conclusion that the allegations were well-founded. Towards the end of October, all the alleged victims received a letter from Fr Louis Mallia, superior-general of the Missionary Society of St Paul (MSSP), telling them their cases against Fr Charles Pulis, Fr Conrad Sciberras and Bro Joseph Bonnett were to be sent to the Vatican for adjudication.

The church has remained silent ever since the group of men first spoke about their case, eight years ago.

Mr Grech fears that the church is doing its best to control the damage, but warned he is not giving up. It may also be that the church is worried that more cases will come to light if it takes action, or that new avenues for victims to sue for damages will be opened.

The church may also be waiting for the criminal court case to be concluded and judgement to be passed before taking any action, Mr Grech noted.

The court proceedings have speeded up considerably in the past year. The compilation of evidence has been closed, the prosecution and the defence counsel will be presenting their final submissions in June and judgement is expected six weeks later, on 2 August.

Although in January, a Constitutional case was filed by lawyer Gianella Caruana Curran who is defending the priests, claiming that “media over-exposure” has breached their right to a fair hearing, the court presiding over the criminal case decided not to suspend the hearing while the Constitutional case is ongoing.

While the first case is finally nearing conclusion, witnesses are expected to testify before the Constitutional Court in its next sitting.

Mr Grech said sadly that he and the other alleged victims had not fallen out with the Church because the Church had brought them up, but its authorities and priests have nonetheless become their enemies.

He pointed out that an Open Day had recently been held at St Joseph Home where they had grown up, but none of them had been invited to it.

“Even unofficially, no priest has ever asked for me or communicated with me, although they know where I live,” said Mr Grech. “I would ask if these people are truly practising God’s preaching.”

He acknowledges that everyone can regret something they have done, but believes people should ultimately face up to their responsibilities.

He has not simply decided to take action and hopefully see the perpetrators of his abuse brought to justice just for himself, as he is in the meantime wanting to help others.

Mr Grech believes that the abuse problem is enormous, and while giving snippets of what he went through, says he wants to stop these things from continuing to happen.

Describing his own children as angels, Mr Grech adds: “I don’t want to be selfish and just look after my children, when other angels like them are being abused”.

Cover-up

2011-04-03T06:35:00.000-07:00

http://brokenrites.alphalink.com.au/nletter/page214-william-stanley-irwin.html
REVEALED: The church kept quiet about Brother William Stanley Irwin

By a Broken Rites researcher

Broken Rites Australia has researched a Catholic religious Brother, William Stanley Irwin, who sexually abused a Melbourne teenage male to whom he was providing "counselling". Despite this breach of pastoral ethics, the church authorities protected Irwin and later promoted him. The victim finally obtained justice when Irwin was convicted in a Sydney criminal court on 31 March 2011.

During Irwin's court hearings in 2009-2011, it emerged that:

In the year of the abuse (1986), Brother Irwin was officially a church "youth counsellor" and was providing "counselling" to this Melbourne teenager — that is, a supposedly pastoral relationship.

The teenager's parents trusted Brother Irwin to take their son (then aged 17) on a road trip from Melbourne to New South Wales and return. That is, the victim was in Irwin's custody. During the trip, Irwin sexually abused the teenager.

After the teenager's parents complained to the church authorities about the abuse (and the breach of trust), Brother Irwin admitted his guilt. The church authorities then assured the parents that Brother Irwin would not be allowed to work with youngsters again. Relieved by this promise, the parents did not report Irwin to the police. Thus, the matter was kept quiet.

But the promise about Irwin's restricted future was not kept — he was allowed to continue working, unencumbered, as a teacher and "youth counsellor" in Catholic schools and parishes.

About 1992, the church upgraded Irwin from a religious brother to a priest, making him "Father" Irwin. He was sent to minister as a priest in Western Australia and Queensland but his new congregations were not aware of his previous abuse.

Irwin's abuse was finally exposed when the Melbourne victim spoke to New South Wales police in 2009, resulting in criminal court charges.
On 31 March 2011 a Sydney District Court jury found William Stanley Irwin (aged 55) guilty on two counts of "gross indecency on a male under the age of 18". He is scheduled to return to court later in 2011 for sentencing.

Irwin was a member of the Catholic order of Vincentian priests and brothers (this order is also known as the Congregation of the Mission).

The offences occurred when Irwin and the Melbourne boy stayed overnight at St Stanislaus College (a boys' boarding school, owned by the Vincentian order) in Bathurst, west of Sydney, in New South Wales, during school holidays in 1986. Irwin was a former pupil, and former teacher, at this school.

This New South Wales court case was confined to Irwin's abuse of the teenage victim in New South Wales. Anybody else who wishes to provide relevant information about the activities of William Irwin, in any other part of Australia, would need to talk to police in the state in which the activity occurred.

Irwin becomes a priest
Broken Rites research has found some information about William Irwin in the 1990s, after his 1986 abuse of the Melbourne boy was reported to the Vincentians.

The 1992 yearbook of St Stanislaus College, Bathurst, contains photographs of Father Bill Irwin, CM (the letters "CM" stand for Congregation of the Mission):

One photo shows "The ordination of Father Bill Irwin, CM" at the St Stanislaus College chapel.

A second photo shows him cutting a cake: "Br. Bill becomes Father Bill Irwin".

A third photo shows Father Bill Irwin with six Old Boys of St Stanislaus at Bill Irwin's ordination.
The Vincentians are an Australia-wide order, and "Reverend" William Irwin was later listed as working in other states:
In the 1994 edition of the annual Australian Catholic Directory, Broken Rites found Father William Irwin listed at St Vincent's parish, Kwinana, Western Australia.

In the 1995 and 1996 directories, Fr William Irwin was listed at the "Catholic Mission", Oxenford, Queensland (along with a fellow-Vincentian, Father Brian Spillane, who also has since been convicted of child-sex offences).

From about 1996 onwards, Fr William Irwin evidently worked outside the Vincentians — the annual Catholic directories (until 2006) listed Rev. William Irwin as on leave from the Vincentians, care of the Vincentian national office. After 2006, Father Irwin's name was dropped from the Catholic directory.

When police arrested him in 2009, Irwin was at St Aloysius College, Milsons Point, Sydney (a Catholic day school for boys, run by the Jesuits), where he had been a chaplain and teacher since 2003.
Background of the case
According to statements made in court, William Irwin was a former pupil of St Stanislaus College, Bathurst. Here he was introduced to the culture of the Vincentian Fathers and Brothers. The Vincentians recruited him as a member and he joined the order in 1975 in his late teens, becoming "Brother" Irwin. He was based at St Stanislaus College between 1980 and 1983 and between 1987 and 1989.

The prosecution said that in between these two stints, Irwin worked in the mid-1980s in a Melbourne parish and was a "spiritual leader" in the Catholic youth group, Antioch. His role included providing "counselling" to youths aged between 15 and 18.

A Melbourne family consulted Irwin for assistance with counselling for their son, the prosecution said. The boy's parents, who trusted Brother Irwin, told Irwin that their son had been sexually abused at the age of 15 by another man, who later pleaded guilty and was jailed. The boy began visiting Irwin for counselling sessions, often in priests' quarters.

The prosecution said that, in the second half of 1986 when the youth was 17, Irwin allegedly took him on a trip from Melbourne to Sydney, where they stayed in a seminary. They then allegedly stayed overnight at St Stanislaus College, Bathurst. No pupils were there as it was in the school holidays.

At St Stanislaus College, Irwin told the boy to lie on a bed with him and Irwin then behaved indecently, the prosecution said.

In the weeks or months after the assault, the teenager reported the abuse to a nun. When his parents heard about the assault, they complained to the Vincentian order (instead of reporting the crime to the police). The Vincentian Order's Australian head (known as "the Provincial") allegedly promised to the parents that Irwin would be removed from all positions involving contact with children or young people. But that did not happen, the prosecution said, and in fact Irwin went on to be a dormitory master at St Stanislaus for two years, during which time he also taught "personal development" and "religion".

The prosecution said that police had located the Vincentian order's file on the matter, which was headed "strictly confidential". In it, the Vincentians' Australian head allegedly recorded that Irwin had admitted the "bed incident". [However, for legal reasons, the jury was absent when the court was told about this file; and, again for legal reasons, the jury was also absent when the court was told about the Vincentians' promise to keep Irwin away from children.]

Court proceedings
After police arrested William Irwin in November 2009, he appeared before a magistrate in Sydney's Downing Centre Local court on 1 December 2009 and again on 11 February 2010. These were brief, procedural hearings to file the charges. The investigation had been made by detectives from Bathurst, where St Stanislaus College is located.

In March 2011, William Stanley Irwin appeared in the Sydney District Court, where he pleaded not guilty to the two charges of gross indecency. This necessitated a jury trial.

The victim (aged 41 at the time of Irwin's trial) told the jury that, after being sexually abused by another man at the age of 15 (while on work experience), he felt "depressed and very confused, with very low self-esteem". He later began receiving counselling from Brother Bill Irwin, who "seemed to understand where I was coming from".

The victim said that when he tried to explain his feelings, Irwin would often put his arms around his shoulder and gave him a hug at the end of a session.

The victim described the trip to New South Wales. He said that when he and Irwin stayed overnight at St Stanislaus College, he was asked to Irwin's room and then was told to lie down on Irwin's bed. He said Irwin kissed him, fondled him sexually and then got him to masturbate Irwin and vice-versa.

"Brother Bill said we should keep this to ourselves," he said.

The victim said that after returning to his room, he remembered "tossing and turning that night thinking about what had happened and feeling very confused. I remember I was upset".

The victim's mother gave evidence in court. She told the jury how upset her son was when he later disclosed being sexually assaulted by Br. William Irwin.

"He felt he was let down because Br. Bill was the one who was supposed to be helping him," she said.

William Stanley Irwin gave evidence in court. He denied that he had taken the youth to visit St Stanislaus College and he denied that he had ever sexually abused the youth.

Guilty verdict
After the jury (comprising eight women and four men) returned a verdict of guilty, Judge Ronald Solomon remanded William Stanley Irwin on bail. A further hearing is scheduled for later in 2011, at which the prosecution and the defence will make final submissions before the judge decides the sentence.

Vienna

2011-04-03T06:25:00.000-07:00

http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/vienna-presbyterian-church-works-to-overcome-revelations-of-sexual-abuse/2011/03/30/AF3hNxQC_story.html
Vienna Presbyterian Church seeks forgiveness, redemption in wake of abuse scandal
By Josh White, Saturday, April , 10:04 PM
Pastor Peter James stood before his congregation at Vienna Presbyterian Church last Sunday and paused before giving one of the most difficult sermons of his life.

Framed by the light coming through the sanctuary’s huge windows, James spoke of sexual abuse by a youth director, of the church’s shortcomings and of the tormenting darkness that has been eating away at the church for nearly six years. A row of young women sat in a back pew as James apologized for just recently learning that their ordeal was “far more devastating and horrific than we had imagined.”

“We failed as leaders to extend the compassion and mercy that you needed,” James said, publicly acknowledging the church’s failings for the first time. “Some of you felt uncared for, neglected and even blamed for this abuse. I am sorry. The church is sorry.”

James’s sermon — and a letter detailing the situation for the congregation’s more than 2,500 members in Northern Virginia’s affluent suburbs — comes as the church reels from the recent discovery that as many as a dozen teenage girls may have suffered sexual, emotional and spiritual abuse at the hands of a youth director who worked there from 2001 to 2005.

The breadth of the accusations and the nature of them have shocked the relatively staid congregation and laid bare the kind of damage that can result from a combination of secretive predation, blind trust and a desire to move on without a full exploration of what really happened. It is the kind of tragedy that has affected churches across the country, and there’s no formula for how to deal with it. But Vienna Presbyterian leaders hope that shining light on their failings will lead to redemption, education and healing.

Concerned church elders approached The Washington Post recently as details of abuse began to emerge privately, and they have cooperated with a two-month Post investigation.

Five women and their families said in separate interviews that former youth director Eric DeVries infiltrated their lives and manipulated the girls into what they thought were mutual romantic relationships. They said he drew them in as a trusted mentor, friend and Christian role model before professing his love, saying that he wanted to marry them, imploring them to keep the relationship secret and then progressively increasing sexual contact as they approached adulthood.

DeVries, then in his early 30s, maintained simultaneous relationships with several girls, some of them sets of sisters and best friends, according to the interviews with the women. He took them to concerts, community service events, mission trips and camps out of state and out of the country, stealing private moments after chaperons had gone to sleep or when he thought no one was looking. Instances of abuse took place in a girl’s home, in the church’s minivan and in DeVries’s church office, according to the women and their families.

The girls — now young women — said one of the most damaging aspects was that DeVries made them think the relationships were real, bolstering his declarations of love with Scripture that he said made everything okay.

Now in therapy, several of the women said they have persistent trouble with relationships, seeking to re-create a fantasy that came to an end only when DeVries was publicly accused of abusing one girl. He was forced to resign, pleaded guilty to contributing to the delinquency of a minor and then left the area in late 2005.

“He was fulfilling the idea of my ideal and was validating that it was real,” said Rebecca Verley, now 23, who said she was abused during her teen years. The Washington Post generally does not identify victims of sex abuse, but Verley and another victim agreed to speak openly. “I didn’t tell anyone because I thought people would look down on me.”

The victims now say church officials failed them by asking few questions when trouble arose six years ago, ignoring at least one of them when she tried to come forward and making it difficult for the others to report what had happened. Church members supported DeVries in court, lent him money, helped him move out of his Fairfax condominium. Members of the church community said some even blamed the girls, saying that they threw themselves at him and that it would be difficult for a young man to avoid such temptation.

Now, the young women want the church to reach out to other potential victims, seek restoration and make changes so events do not repeat themselves. They think the church let them down by treating the abuse as isolated, ignoring what later became an insidious problem and allowing rumors and speculation to trump fact.

The healing process began in late 2008 with the arrival of Associate Pastor David Jordan-Haas, who recognized the damage and sought to correct it. The church formed a new abuse outreach ministry in 2009 and last year, for the first time, heard the full story of one of the women. Since then, the church has been reaching out to all victims and, last week, made the situation public.

Jordan-Haas thinks the church is heading in the right direction after experiencing a “calculated and evil” deception made worse by complacency.

“We really seek to change, institutionally and relationally, and that comes at a cost,” Jordan-Haas said. “There is still something hopeful here, and that brings me great relief. It is good when we bring the darkness into the light.”

DeVries, now 39 and living in the northwest Indiana suburbs of Chicago, said in an interview that he had “inappropriate and immoral” relationships with three of the girls but declined to discuss specifics. He said that he understands it was wrong of him and that he regrets what he has done to the church.

“I hurt people in the whole congregation, and people think of me and they think I’m a horrible person,” DeVries said. “I still have nightmares, knowing I hurt so many people.”

At Sunday’s service, James said the church is not a museum for saints but rather a hospital for sinners, declaring that hypocrites are everywhere and that DeVries was just a particularly dangerous and devious one. But he also said the church has avoided the truth for too long, and speaking directly to God he said the church would continue to seek it out and deal with it openly.

“This awful truth is hard to admit to you and to ourselves,” James said. “We have imagined ourselves to be too refined and too sophisticated and too prosperous to admit this to you. We have failed to do justice, love mercy and walk humbly with you.”

‘The lines were
so blurred’

DeVries arrived at Vienna Presbyterian Church in September 2001 after a stint as a residential director at his alma mater in Michigan, Calvin College. He had worked at a church in Alabama and at a Christian summer camp in Pennsylvania, and officials at Vienna Presbyterian said he came with glowing recommendations.

Shortly after his arrival, however, church officials said the staff at a Pennsylvania religious summer camp notified them that DeVries had inappropriate contact with a 14-year-old girl after the previous summer and that he would need counseling to return to the camp. They said they were never aware of any physical abuse, and DeVries said his contacts with the girl were limited to e-mails and text messages meant to boost her self-esteem.

Daryl Wright, who was then the interim youth director at the church and is still on staff there, said he spoke to DeVries, who brushed it off as a misunderstanding.

“I made two very significant errors,” Wright said. “I did not ask the question about whether this incident could be part of a larger picture. The second question I didn’t ask was should somebody who obviously crosses a boundary working with a young girl ever be employed as a full-time youth director?”

DeVries settled in quickly, and parents and church leaders saw that he was particularly good at relating to the teenagers they hoped would someday form the core of the church. The youth group thrived, and DeVries created an energy and enthusiasm that led to growing numbers.

Cindy Hamblen met DeVries in the spring of 2002, when her parents hosted a pool party for the youth group at their Vienna home. Hamblen said DeVries, then about 30 years old, started to pay a lot of attention to her at Sunday school. She was 17.

“The attention I was getting was so great,” said Hamblen, now 26 and an elementary school teacher. Hamblen agreed to speak openly about what happened and has shared her story with senior church leaders. “He would treat me like an adult. He would tell dirty jokes. He would talk about sex all the time. He was fascinated by sex.”

Over the course of her senior year, Hamblen said, DeVries groomed her for a relationship.

“I was in love with an idea, this being that he created,” Hamblen said. “But that wasn’t him. He created this idea for so many people.”

During a youth group ski trip in early 2003, just before her 18th birthday, she said, the two were reading a sex-tip list in Cosmopolitan magazine while lying under a blanket.

“He was going down the list saying, ‘I’d like to do that to you. How would that feel? Would you do that to me?’ ” Hamblen said. “The lines were so blurred. Even when the youth-director hat was on, he was still making moves. He made it seem like he was helping my faith, making me a better person. It turned out he was using my faith to take advantage of me.”

On that ski trip, a younger girl took a prescription narcotic to help relieve pain. When that student nearly passed out and needed to be carried to her room, Hamblen said, DeVries started to undress her and tried to remove her bra.

Hamblen said she had to pull the girl into the bathroom to prevent it from going further. That girl, who has asked that her name not be used, also described a lengthy grooming process and sexual and psychological abuse.

The next month, three days after Hamblen’s 18th birthday, DeVries invited Hamblen to a romantic Valentine’s Day rendezvous at his home.

“He made a more serious sexual move at that point,” Hamblen said. “The fact that he groomed me and waited for me to turn 18 just heightens the abuse. If it had happened 72 hours earlier, would anyone look at it differently?”

Hamblen said DeVries taught her how to be deceptive and led her to lie to her family. She said she concealed meetings with him, was arrested at a Jimmy Buffett concert after he encouraged her to get alcohol while underage and gave her the impression that they had a future together.

Sue Hamblen, Cindy’s mother, has been actively involved in the church and is on the staff there. She said she thought DeVries had a good perspective about children and related well to them.

“It eats me alive what happened on my watch,” Sue Hamblen said. “And I didn’t see it, and I didn’t stop it.”

While DeVries was in a physically romantic relationship with Cindy Hamblen, he also aggressively pursued other teenagers in the youth group, according to the women, including the girl whom he nearly undressed on the ski trip. In the summer of 2003, she said, DeVries bought her beer at a minor league baseball game in North Carolina and was professing love for her at a two-week camp in Pennsylvania.

“He said that we had something very special and that if he had a ring he would marry me right now,” said the woman, now 23. “I was elated.”

According to a journal entry the woman made on Aug. 24, 2003, DeVries invited her into his office and read a passage from Genesis that speaks of Jacob waiting seven years to marry Rachel because his love for her was so strong. She was 15 at the time.

From there, she said, it escalated into massages, cuddling on out-of-state trips, and groping under a blanket on a flight back from a trip to Mexico, with other church members sitting around them. He would send notes on index cards hinting at a deep connection and a future with him.

“I was psychologically manipulated and would have done anything he wanted,” she said. “I was under a spell.”

Verley, 23, likewise fell under a spell while she was 16. In June 2004, DeVries sat with her while watching “Terminator 3” at a party and began stroking her arm. He later commented that she had smooth skin and started sending her texts in which he signed off, “Love, Eric.”

In September 2004, DeVries took Verley and others to a Toby Keith concert in Prince William County. In the church van in the parking lot after the show — a vehicle students named “Nigel” — she said DeVries climbed into the back and snuggled with her, putting his arm around her bare midriff.

Months later, in early 2005, DeVries became only the second person Verley had ever kissed, in his church office. She said he also groped her in a broom closet. He would text her about how he was thinking about kissing her. Later, when she was 17, he spelled out what his sexual boundaries were.

Those boundaries were explored with another girl, who declined through family members to speak with The Post. The victim’s sister, however, described how DeVries slowly worked his way into their family — becoming so close that they gave him a key to their house — and ultimately spent several nights a week on the couch with her sister until after midnight.

It became clear to her what was going on. Then 15 years old, the girl started spying on her older sister, checking out her cellphone and following DeVries.

“She was under the impression she was going to marry him,” said the sister, now a 21-year-old college student. The Post is not identifying her in order to protect the family’s identity. “But I saw him being close with other girls, and I followed him around and told him that I knew. . . . I was obsessed with figuring him out.”

In September 2005, she found explicit sexual images that DeVries sent to her sister’s phone and went to the church to report the relationship.

‘We ignored it,
the church ignored it’

James, the senior pastor, said he was shocked to hear that his youth director could be involved in inappropriate behavior. Thinking he was doing the right thing, he asked the 15-year-old into a meeting with DeVries to confront him. The girl bawled through most of it and told of her sister’s texts and photos.

DeVries did not deny that he had acted inappropriately but said only that he had kissed the girl. In a later meeting involving the victim, her family and DeVries, the victim also said that was the extent of it, though in reality the relationship had become far more physical, according to her sister and law enforcement officials.

“I didn’t know what was going on other than he had crossed boundaries,” James said in a recent interview. “It wasn’t accessible to us. He was involved physically with her, and it seemed he was manipulating emotions to get into that position.”

At the time, James said, DeVries admitted to having a relationship with Hamblen — who was by then an adult college student — and James and other church staffers did not press further, wanting to protect victims and “honor their anonymity.”

So Session, a Presbyterian church’s democratic leadership body, forced DeVries to resign and a week later reported the case to Fairfax County Child Protective Services. Although there was a sense things could be worse, church officials let it drop.

“We felt like we couldn’t get at it,” James said. “Now we’re learning they wished I had. I didn’t see that, and it saddens me.”

DeVries, with the help of church elders and close friends, moved back to his home town in Illinois while the criminal justice process went forward.

According to court records, DeVries initially was charged with taking indecent liberties with a minor — proposing sexual contact with a minor under his supervision — a felony that requires registry as a sex offender. In February 2006, he pleaded guilty to the lesser offense of contributing to the delinquency of a minor and received a one-year suspended jail sentence.

The victim’s family members wrote to the judge in the case and said that they “loved and trusted him completely” and treated him like a member of their family.

“We now know there is a secret, dark side to Eric,” the family wrote, according to a copy of the Dec. 30, 2005, letter. “Our lament is that we failed to recognize the many signs that a sexual predator was in our midst.”

Detective John Kelly of the Fairfax police investigated the case in 2005 and said he suspected that there were more victims. But in a situation where victims were willingly involved with the offender and psychologically tied to him, it is sometimes difficult to find them.

“Through the success of her case, I was hoping people would come forward,” Kelly said, adding that if additional alleged felonies surface in the case he still would pursue them.

DeVries said that he never intended to hurt anyone but that he was seeking intimacy and a family and allowed his feelings to escalate out of control.

“I became too close with them emotionally, and it was immoral, and I’m sad I hurt them,” DeVries said. “It was the low point of my life, without a doubt. The shame of it — it was a life-changing event.”

Compounding the problem for the girls was that the church appeared to support DeVries. He was allowed to apologize to the youth group and gave a teary farewell, saying he would see them in heaven. Some held prayer circles for him, and there were lunch fundraisers. Ginni Richards, who was on staff, asked some members of the church to write letters praising DeVries’s character for the judge to read. More than 25 wrote.

It was a move that Richards cries about even today. Then close to DeVries and thinking he was a good person, Richards knew he had done something wrong but felt that as a Christian she needed to walk beside DeVries in his time of need.

“I really regret the pain that the letters caused for those girls,” Richards said. “They went underground and believed they were not valued by their own church. . . . Then we entered this period of time where it was like it all didn’t happen. We ignored it, the church ignored it and made everyone feel like it was taken care of and that we could move on. The truth was not coming out, and I feel like the girls and their families had to fend for themselves.”

Hamblen said she felt as if members of the church blamed the victims for the abuse, talking behind their backs and driving some of them — such as her — away.

“I was a member of the church since I was 2, and the church met every need in my life,” she said. “When I needed them most, they didn’t respond. When I spoke, they didn’t listen. . . . The pain and hurt the church has caused is deep and lasting.”

Another teenage girl who became close to DeVries near the end of his time at Vienna Presbyterian said: “The church community seemed to think that he was a good person who had messed up. People would say, ‘Can’t they just get over it?’ ”

James said he understands that the church’s response was inadequate and that he now knows that what happened affected an entire generation of church youths.

“It drove some of them away from the church and some of them away from faith altogether,” James said.

‘Finally willing to take ownership’

Jordan-Haas, the associate pastor, arrived there in November 2008. When informed that there had been problems with a previous youth director, he began asking questions and noticed the issue tearing at the fabric of the church. He found that the issue had not been explored, that there appeared to be the potential for numerous victims, and he encountered families and young women who were still hurting or just beginning to deal with their pain.

Jordan-Haas ultimately became part of what is now known as NewSpring Ministry, developed at the church in 2009 to reach out to and help abuse victims.

“There had been an instinct to silence things, to get it done with, to move on,” Jordan-Haas said. “There are layers of culpability. There were plenty of red flags, and too many people suffering.”

Members of the congregation began to see it, too. Mary Heppner, who has two daughters, donated $25,000 because the issue so strongly moved her.

“I hope that young women that need help will feel free to come forward and they will recognize that they were abused and will get help,” Heppner said.

Paige Fishel, a family therapist who is consulting Vienna Presbyterian and NewSpring, said that what the church and its members did probably damaged some of their most vulnerable congregants, but she said the church’s steps now to fully hear them out, investigate and apologize have made a difference.

The church “was finally willing to take ownership for what happened on their watch, to consider themselves part of the collective offender along with Eric,” Fishel said. “And they began to work to identify who had been hurt, what their needs were and how to meet those needs.”

G. Wilson Gunn Jr., the general presbyter for the National Capital region — akin to a Catholic bishop — said he was not fully aware of the situation until a few weeks ago. He said that the Presbyterian Church has a solid sexual-abuse policy and teams of people who respond to such situations but that they were not called into action because Vienna Presbyterian appears to have tried to contain the issue within the church.

Gunn said a recent review of sex abuse cases showed that 40 of the 180 churches in his area have had to deal with the issue. He attended Sunday’s sermon and vowed to do whatever is necessary to reverse that trend.

“It’s been all too common in the past,” Gunn said, “and those days have to end.”

‘What’s important is what they do next’

DeVries moved on, settling in northwest Indiana and working for a paving company. He married in 2008 — he said he discussed his earlier problems openly with his wife — and now has two sons, a toddler and a newborn.

Although he attends church near his home, DeVries said he has no involvement with youth activities there. Vienna Presbyterian officials said they have stayed in contact with DeVries’s pastors in an effort to monitor him; church officials in Indiana did not return calls seeking comment.

“I knew I was never going to be involved in ministry or working with kids again,” DeVries said. “I knew that, because of what I had done, that was not an option for me for the rest of my life.”

The sister of the girl whose case went to court said she hopes DeVries understands what he has done, even to people who were not physically abused.

“I hope he knows how much he shattered people’s idea of what Christianity is and what being part of a church is,” she said. “It shattered my faith in church. I always wonder what people are really thinking and doing behind the scenes.”

The Sunday sermons — at all three services — were well attended, and the solemn message appeared to resonate. The pastor highlighted a passage from Mark, which spoke of the danger of religious hypocrisy, or using prayers just for appearances. He apologized and vowed to bring darkness into the light.

The mother of one of the young women leaned over in the rear pew and said softly: “What’s important is what they do next. Or are these just empty prayers, like the ones in Mark?”

Allegations ignored

2011-04-03T02:50:00.000-07:00

http://cogicabusewatch.wordpress.com/2011/04/02/cogic-and-bishop-still-silent-on-sexual-abuse-and-gay-clergy/
COGIC and Bishop still silent on sexual abuse and gay clergy
April 2, 2011

Little Rock – The COGIC Arkansas bishop who allegedly ignored critical allegations should be removed from office if proven that he indeed sat on information from parents of teen boys who had been molested by a pastor under his charge.

But don’t hold your breath waiting for the administration of Bishop Charles Blake to move expeditiously and address the growing cloud of clergy sexual scandals attached to its name. Its been five months since Ronald Paige of Earle, Ar was found murdered and several weeks since the allegations of his secret life and crimes were uncovered by Memphis media. But there has been not a single statement from Bishop LT Walker, Bishop Blake, or COGIC.

Witnesses have said they reported Paige’s actions to Bishop LT Walker, but Paige stayed in office until he was murdered by a 21 year old homeless man he allegedly attempted to rape.

Regarding reporting sexual abuse of children, the law is clear and does not exclude ministers for any reason. In April 2003 the Arkansas legislature amended the list of mandatory child abuse reporters to include ministers. The amendment added the following category to a long list of mandatory reporters: “Any clergyman, which includes a minister, priest, rabbi, accredited Christian Science practitioner, or other similar functionary of a religious organization, or an individual reasonably believed to be so by the person consulting him or her, except to the extent he or she has acquired knowledge of suspected maltreatment through communications required to be kept confidential pursuant …”

A looming question hampers holding bishops in the church truly accountable. Do COGIC jurisdictions or its national church keep documented records of sexual abuse cases on file? Is there a paper trail from the crime to church authorities? Based on the law, could authorities inspect those files for patterns of withholding information of sex criminals?

Gwen Fox’s 15 year old son Tobias was molested by COGIC General Board member Bishop John Husband in a Memphis hotel room during the national convocation in 1981. Fox said that she was repeatedly told that she should not ”go against” the scripture by taking the church to the law over the case. Although she personally went to Memphis and plead for her son’s cause and personally mailed certified letters to every member of the General Board detailing the crime, she received no justice for what happened to her son. After years of financial struggle brought on by three heart attacks, she finally decided to “disobey” the church and seek legal redress. But she soon found out the statue of limitations (in Tennessee) had run out. Fox believes church officials intentionally stalled her to prevent the case from going to court. Through his lawyer, Husband who died in 1991, admitted complete guilt.

But the pattern of cold, unfeeling silence seems to continue.

The church should call for an immediate, investigation as to whether or not Walker reported to authorities what was given to him by parents of underage boys. To regain a legacy being tarnished, the investigation should be made public to reassure victimized parents and children that the church does not value the criminal over the victim.

In his DNC speech, Bishop Blake criticized prolife conservatives for being “silent and indifferent” about inner city injustices, but what about his own silence and inaction?

Although Blake intimated he was frustrated with his party’s support of abortion, he praised its positions for the helpless in other ways.

“Others loudly proclaim their advocacy for the unborn,” he said, receiving a standing ovation, “but they refuse to recognize their responsibility and the responsibility of our nation to those who have been born.

“They are presently and historically silent, if not indifferent,” he continued, “to the suffering of our inner cities.”

Why is the hurt of small town parents whose sons have been sexually violated not being acknowledged publicly? Micah 6:8 said that God requires us to do justice, love mercy and walk humbly, but for the parents and these victimized boys, there seems to be no justice. Or mercy. Only silent arrogance.

COGIC is busy preparing for its quadrennial elections. Bishops are campaigning and members are speculating. Will any of those who are striving to get onto the church’s presidium take up a cry for the victims of clergy sexual abuse? Will any bishop stand in the gap? Or is it church business as usual?

To its shame, COGIC has taken a position of silence in the face of these sex crimes by its clergy and still has yet to respond publicly to Paige’s alleged crimes and subsequent murder.

Related:

•Clergy sexual abuse poll
•Dealing with clergy sexual abuse
•COGIC takes a step in the right direction

Cover-up

2011-04-03T02:43:00.000-07:00

http://www.windsorstar.com/news/Sylvestre+moved+protect+faithful/4549011/story.html

Sylvestre moved to 'protect faithful'
Priest's abuse known, trial told
By Trevor Wilhelm, The Windsor Star April 2, 2011 •Story•Photos ( 1 )
Friday, April 1, 2011, marked the end of a three-week trial in the civil case against the London diocese by Kelly Murphy-Myers, 41, of Chatham, who is suing the diocese for $3.5 million for sexual abuse at the hands of Father Charle Sylvestre at St. Ursula’s parish in Chatham. Shown here is this 2006 file photo, police officers escort Sylvestre after leaving a Chatham courtroom. Sylvestre was convicted in 2006 of 47 counts of indecent assault involving girls at parishes in Windsor, Sarnia, London, Chatham and Pain Court over four decades. He died in 2007 at age 84, only months into his three-year prison sentence.Photograph by: Dan Janisse, The Windsor StarChurch officials quietly shuffled pedophile priest Charles Sylvestre from church to church in order to "protect the victims," a London diocese lawyer said Friday.

Susan Metzler made the acknowledgment in a London courtroom during closing arguments of the first lawsuit involving Sylvestre to go to trial.

She said parishes were historically not told about abuse to "protect the faithful overall" and not "shake their faith" in the church or good priests. In the past, said Metzler, there was a belief that praying about the abuse problem would "correct" it.

"But the impact was not appreciated, nor was the fact you can't put a pedophile back with children. It just wasn't known," Metzler, with the Toronto law firm Miller Thomson, said during her closing arguments.

"They wanted to protect the victims and they thought they were doing that."

Friday marked the end of a three-week civil trial. Kelly Murphy-Myers, 41, of Chatham, is suing the diocese for $3.5 million for sexual abuse at the hands of Sylvestre at St. Ursula's parish in Chatham.

Sylvestre was convicted in 2006 of 47 counts of indecent assault involving girls at parishes in Windsor, Sarnia, London, Chatham and Pain Court over four decades. Dozens more victims of Sylvester have since come forward.

He died in 2007 at age 84, only months into his threeyear prison sentence. The diocese has settled 65 lawsuits involving Sylvestre and has 12 remaining, including the Murphy-Myers case.

Metzler said the diocese now openly deals with abuse, including creating new policies and making public apologies. The practice of keeping things quiet to protect identities and reputations is a thing of the past, she said.

"We look back now and see that was completely wrong," said Metzler. "The reason for keeping it quiet was completely wrong. We know that now."

Murphy-Myers' lawyer Rob Talach said that doesn't free the diocese of responsibility. He said the church was really more worried about its own image and "keeping customers" than protecting children.

"We're not dealing with an issue of 'we didn't know better,'" said Talach, with the London law firm Ledroit Beckett. "Clearly, the intention here was to protect the church over the people."

He said the diocese must be punished for its secrecy, border line obstruction of justice and "silent shuffle" of Sylvestre to send a strong message to other groups thinking of doing the same.

"If there is one thing this decision can do.... it can send a piercing sound in the form of punitive damages that this conduct is not acceptable and this conduct will be punished," said Talach.

He said the diocese was negligent because it either lost or destroyed personnel files on Sylvestre, didn't always cooperate with police and quietly shuffled Sylvestre from church to church to avoid scandal.

"The negligence is so extreme here," said Talach.

"By the time he gets to Chatham, the diocese is recklessly employing an unfit person to be with children."

Talach said the diocese's repeated transferring of Sylvestre from one parish to the next and the "failure" to stop the abuse was "a true opportunity missed."

If they had done some "snooping around," Talach said, his client might never have been abused.

Read more: http://www.windsorstar.com/news/Sylvestre+moved+protect+faithful/4549011/story.html#ixzz1IS4KLv3J

"Pedophile pimp"

2011-04-03T02:36:00.000-07:00

http://www.cnn.com/2011/POLITICS/04/01/new.hampshire.congressman.comments/
New Hampshire congressman calls Catholic bishop a 'pedophile pimp'By Leigh Remizowski, CNNApril 1, 2011 11:00 p.m. EDT
STORY HIGHLIGHTS
D.J. Bettencourt made the comments on his Facebook page
The comments follow a rally Thursday where the bishop criticized state budget cuts
The bishop resigned in 2003 after his diocese settled sexual abuse lawsuits
(CNN) -- The New Hampshire House majority leader lashed out Friday on his Facebook page at a Roman Catholic bishop, calling the clergyman a "pedophile pimp" who "has no moral credibility to lecture anyone."

The comments come in the wake of a rally Thursday where John McCormack, who is bishop of the Roman Catholic Manchester Diocese, criticized state budget cuts that he argued would hurt "the most vulnerable in our society," according to a transcript of his remarks posted on the diocese's website.

State Rep. D.J. Bettencourt responded with a Facebook post Friday morning that said, "Would the Bishop like to discuss his history of protecting the 'vulnerable?' This man is a pedophile pimp who should have been led away from the State House in handcuffs with a rain coat over his head in disgrace. He has absolutely no moral credibility to lecture anyone."

McCormack resigned from his post as bishop in 2003 when the Diocese of Manchester settled more than 170 lawsuits alleging sexual abuse by priests in New Hampshire. He was also a top official in the Archdiocese of Boston during its sex abuse scandal.

Manchester Diocese spokesman Kevin Donovan said Bettencourt's comment was "false, defamatory and detracts from the real issue."

"Bishop McCormack's message to the people of New Hampshire yesterday was the simple message of the Gospels. The Church and our broader society have a fundamental obligation to care for the poor," Donovan said in a statement. "The bishop's message is a challenge to ourselves and our elected officials to never waver in our obligation to care for the most vulnerable of society."

Bettencourt could not be reached for comment.

New Hampshire GOP Chairman Jack Kimball said in a statement Friday that he has not spoken to Bettencourt yet following the Facebook posting, "but I am disappointed with his words and I don't share his sentiments."

Catholic brother found guilty

2011-04-01T04:29:00.000-07:00

http://www.smh.com.au/nsw/catholic-brother-abused-boy-he-was-counselling-20110331-1cnhj.html
Catholic brother abused boy he was counselling Louise Hall Courts
April 1, 2011
.A FORMER Catholic brother has been found guilty of sexually abusing a teenager he was counselling after the youth was molested by another man.

In the Sydney District Court yesterday a jury of eight women and four men convicted William Stanley Irwin, 55, on two counts of gross indecency on a male under the age of 18 at St Stanislaus College in Bathurst in the mid-1980s.

The jury heard that Irwin, a former student, house master and part-time teacher at the college, kissed the youth and initiated mutual masturbation when the pair stayed at the boarding school overnight during a road trip in 1986.

Advertisement: Story continues below They were also told that in the weeks or months after the assault the teenager reported the abuse to a nun, and then to his parents, who spoke to the Provincial of the Vincentian order, Father Gerald Scott.

But the jury was not present when the court heard of a ''strictly confidential'' file in which Irwin was recorded as having admitted to ''the bed incident'' during an interview in 1987.

Irwin went on to be a dormitory master at St Stanislaus for two years. After his arrest in 2009 he was stood down from St Aloysius College at Milsons Point, a day school for boys run by the Jesuits, where he had been a chaplain and teacher since 2003.

Irwin, who left the Vincentians in 2002 and lives with his partner in Pyrmont, had pleaded not guilty to the charges.

The victim, who is now 41, had been molested by a man when he was 15 during work experience at the Puffing Billy Railway in Victoria.

His parents told the court that they trusted Irwin, whom they knew as ''Brother Bill'', and asked him to help their son deal with his feelings about the sexual abuse.

The boy began visiting Irwin for counselling sessions, often in priests' quarters.

In the second half of 1986 Irwin drove the boy from Melbourne to Sydney and showed him the Wall in Darlinghurst and told him it was where homosexual men gathered to solicit sex. The Crown argued it was to ''plant'' the idea of homosexual sex in the boy's mind.

Irwin was granted bail and will be sentenced on July 22.

Minister bailed

2011-04-01T04:16:00.000-07:00

http://www.seattlepi.com/local/438019_rape31.html
Bail allowed for minister charged in rape, molestation of teen
Prosecutors ask that he be jailed without bail in early test of new state law
By LEVI PULKKINEN
SEATTLEPI.COM STAFF

Levi Pulkkinen / seattlepi.comRoyce Shorter, a minister and music teacher accused of raping a 15-year-old girl, leaves King County Superior Court on Thursday, March 31, 2011.
In an early test of a change in state law that allows defendants facing life in prison to be held without bail, a King County judge opted to let a minister remain free until he faces allegations that he raped a teenage student at trial.

King County prosecutors had asked that Royce Clenton Shorter be held without bail under a change in state law that allows such an action against defendants facing the possibility of life without parole.

Shorter -- a convicted rapist who faces a life sentence under Washington's "two-strikes" law for violent sex offenders -- was the first King County defendant to face such a pre-trial restriction, approved by voters through a constitutional amendment last year.

The amendment followed the shooting of four Lakewood police officers by Maurice Clemmons, who was facing sex assault charges that may have seen him sentenced to life under the state's "three-strikes" law. But Clemmons had been allowed to bail out of jail shortly before the November 2009 killings.

Asked to lock up Shorter, 54, until a trial is held, King County Superior Court Judge Ronald Kessler declined to do so Thursday. Instead, Kessler ordered that Shorter be placed on electronic detention at his Tacoma home and that he be jailed until that system can be set up.

Previously convicted of rape after having sex with a 12-year-old girl, Shorter stands accused of forcing himself on a 15-year-old piano student.

Shorter operates his own music studio -- 'N Time Music Productions -- and a Christian ministry, Royce Clinton Shorter Ministries. Appearing in court Thursday, Shorter was joined by what his attorney described as 30 supporters. Several had previously put up their homes as collateral to secure a bond for his release.

Speaking with detectives, the girl Shorter is alleged to have raped said Shorter started hitting on her during their lessons, then began kissing and groping her.

The girl said Shorter coerced her into having sex at least five times, beginning when she was 15, Seattle Police Detective Leslie Smith told the court.

"Shorter told her that if she loved him she 'wouldn't tell anybody,'" the detective told the court. "He told her that the last person he did it to told and he had to go to jail."

Shorter told the girl he would deny her allegations if she went to police, Smith added.

Smith noted that on several occasions the girl told Shorter she did not want to have sex or attempted to fight him off. Each time, the detective said, Shorter overcame the girl's defenses.

At the time of the alleged offenses, Shorter's studio was located in South Seattle. He later moved the business to Renton.

Shorter was convicted of child rape in 1985 after he was caught having sex with a 12-year-old girl he met through a choir group. He was also charged and acquitted of having molested a 15-year-old girl in 1993.

Addressing the court Thursday, Senior Deputy Prosecutor Julie Kays noted that Shorter is believed to have sexually assaulted at least six girls. Those alleged attacks occurred too long ago for charges to be filed due to the statute of limitations.

Kays said Shorter used his position of prominence in the community to gain access to the girls.

"All of the women have described a very text book operation by the defendant," Kays told Kessler.

Defense attorney Amy Muth noted that Shorter has not violated the conditions of his release and that there is no "sense of panic."

"He came into this court today with 30 of his supporters," Muth told the judge. "He's not going to run from this."

Prosecutors have now filed five counts against Shorter, including a second-degree rape charge alleging that he used force during a sex assault on the then-15-year-old girl. He is also charged with child molestation, third-degree rape and sexual misconduct with a minor, a charge that alleges he abused a position of authority.

Priest pleads guilty

2011-04-01T04:08:00.000-07:00

http://www.timesnews.net/article.php?id=9030946
Former Kingsport priest's emails, North Carolina apology added to Blountville court files By Kacie Breeding

Published March 31st, 2011 | Added March 31st, 2011 1:47 pm | Comments

William "Bill" Casey

A former Kingsport priest's admission of guilt and apology for sexually abusing a boy in North Carolina are among several items recently added to his case file in Sullivan County court.

William "Bill" Casey, 76, 740 Shakerag Road, Greeneville, is scheduled to stand trial on two counts of aggravated rape and a single charge of first-degree sexual misconduct in Sullivan County Criminal Court on April 11. In a separate case, Casey pleaded guilty to charges of crimes against nature and was given two years of supervised probation in lieu of a three-year suspended sentence in a McDowell County, N.C., court in July of 2010.

Both cases, and a third still pending in Scott County, Va., involve the same alleged victim. Warren Tucker, 45, of Jeffersonville, Ind., alleges Casey sexually abused him from the time he was 10 until he was about 15 years of age. The Sullivan County charges stem from incidents that he alleges occurred while Casey was a priest and he was an altar boy at St. Dominic’s Catholic Church in Kingsport in the 1970s.

Sullivan County Criminal Court Judge Robert Montgomery declined a motion to dismiss Casey's charges last Friday. He also ruled that the North Carolina conviction can be used against him during the upcoming trial.

On Wednesday, Sullivan County Deputy District Attorney Barry Staubus added photos and documents related to the McDowell County case to Casey's file in Sullivan County court. The documents include several emails purportedly written by Casey to various individuals, each one forwarded to Staubus from Father David Boettner of the Knoxville Diocese on March 8.

Casey's admission of guilt and apology for the McDowell County offenses are attached to an email dated July 29, 2010.

The email reads: "I thought you might want to see my plea and statement to the court. My attorney read it. The one who accused me was nearby and heard. He chose to remain silent. Bill Casey."

In the attached document, Casey writes that "many years ago" he had "realized the wrongness of my deeds in relation to Warren Tucker" and "made permanent changes in my life and conduct."

Casey says he, "received the Sacrament of Reconciliation many, many years ago and that brought some peace. But that doesn't take away the deep remorse I feel for having done something wrong and very hurtful. The responsibility rests with me. I was an adult, he was a minor."

He adds that he is, "truly sorry that I have caused Warren Tucker so much pain."

"In a heartfelt way I ask his forgiveness for any and all pain I have caused him," he writes, going on to say that he will spend the rest of his life praying to God for Tucker's "healing and wholeness, and for his family also."

In addition to Tucker's forgiveness, Casey writes that he seeks the same from his own family, friends and others who know him.

He adds that he will, "use any influence I still might have, to get the message across that these things must never happen again."

In an email sent to an undisclosed recipient the day before, Casey says he, "was given the option to make a plea of guilty and be a bit more sure of the outcome."

He describes the terms of his negotiated plea settlement, adding, "I am able to see a bit of hope in the tunnel I've been in."

The email concludes with Casey stating that Tucker is "receiving treatment from the church" and that he continues to "pray for him for complete wholeness."

The earliest email is dated April 21. In it, Casey writes that he is responding to each person who contacted him due to the "difficulty I am swamped in at the present moment." He writes that his attorney, David G. Belser, of Asheville, N.C., recommended that he contact "each of you" and ask that they "consider" writing and mailing a "letter of support" to Belser. It is unclear to whom the email was addressed, as the "To:" line features Casey's name only.

In an email sent two days later, Casey writes, "Dear Friend, Just wanted to say that waiting is not easy. I am hoping the time will come when I can speak. The press and others have already proclaimed a verdict. That doesn't seem entirely right. I appreciate your prayers as we wait. In Christ."

On May 12, 2010, Casey wrote to a man identified as Peter Ferrara, co-founder of an organization called Opus Bono Sacerdotii (Work for the Good of the Priesthood). According to their website, the organization offers confidential assistance to meet the "unique" needs of "priests in crisis."

Casey asks for Ferrara's assistance, citing that he has "very recently been accused of abuse of a minor 30 years ago" and is in a "holding pattern directed by the 2003 Dallas norms." According to bishop-accountability.org, these "norms" refer to the Catholic Church's policies for dealing with allegations of sexual abuse of minors by priests, deacons or other church personnel.

Ferrara responds that he "would be happy to help" and asks Casey to get in touch with him via email or phone.

Staubus' filing also lists two discs. The contents of one disc are described as recordings of a McDowell County investigator's phone call to Casey on April 15 and the message Casey subsequently left for the detective. The second disc reportedly contains a recording of Kingsport Police Detective Chris Tincher's interview of Tucker. Staubus said the discs were not placed in the court file, but were instead delivered directly to Casey's attorneys, Rick and Matthew Spivey.

An attached report describes the recorded exchange between the McDowell County investigator and Casey as well as Casey's follow-up message. The report says Casey agreed to talk, but when asked if he had sexually assaulted Tucker at the Switzerland Inn, he said he would need to speak with his attorney.

When Casey called back, he allegedly told the detective to "take courage that he was cooperating" and that he was "just waiting" to hear back from his attorney.

The photos included in the filing are of the inn and the surrounding area.

In Scott County Circuit Court, Casey is scheduled for a June 27 motions hearing and a July 14 trial.

Victim's father sues order

2011-04-01T04:01:00.000-07:00

http://www.heraldtribune.com/article/20110318/article/110319457
Father of abuse accuser sues religious order

STAFF PHOTO / THOMAS BENDER Buy photo
William C. Wert attends a March 3 bond hearing in a Sarasota courtroom. Wert is accused of having a sexual relationship with a 14-year-old Nokomis boy.

Published: Friday, March 18, 2011 at 4:30 p.m.
Last Modified: Friday, March 18, 2011 at 4:30 p.m.
( page all of 2 )

SARASOTA COUNTY - A Nokomis man filed a lawsuit against The Order of Carmelites on Friday, accusing the religious group of failing to supervise a priest now charged with repeatedly sexually abusing his son.

Related Links:Bail set for priest accused of sex abuse Venice priest at heart of sexual abuse inquiry UPDATE: Venice priest faces more sex abuse charges The lawsuit claims the Carmelites were aware of Father William Wert's past conviction for touching a 14-year-old boy on the inner thigh when they allowed him to move to the Carmelite home in Venice while on a leave of absence.

Wert now faces criminal charges he had a sexual relationship with a 14-year-old Nokomis boy from September to January, including at the order's home, where Wert lived, and in a motel room.

The father of the Nokomis boy, listed in the lawsuit only as John Doe Sr. to protect his son's identity, first contacted authorities when he found inappropriate messages on his son's cell phone.

The lawsuit states that the Order of the Carmelites had a duty to supervise Wert and prevent him from engaging in sexual abuse on its property, which is close to the Epiphany Cathedral and School in Venice.

"They were well aware this man was an abuser and they put him in a position where he could abuse some more," said one of John Doe Sr.'s attorneys, Venice lawyer Bob Widman. "Here's a guy who abused a 14-year-old boy, and you put him in a house that's within walking distance of a school."

The Carmelites, based in Illinois, did not immediately return a call for comment.

Father John Welch, a prior who oversees Wert and 190 Carmelite priests in the continental United States and South America, previously told the Herald-Tribune that he took steps to keep Wert away from children.

Welch said he sent Wert to the church-owned retirement home in Venice because it had "no proximity" to a school, mission or any other Carmelite-run ministry.

Welch did not notify the Catholic Diocese of Venice about Wert's presence or about his conviction. Welch said that was not necessary because Wert was not authorized to perform ministry for the diocese. The diocese is not named in the suit.

Widman said the case was somewhat unusual because there is an entire 2007 criminal case with accusations of sexual conduct by Wert that put the religious order on notice of his dangerous behavior.

That year, a 14-year-old boy at a transit station in Washington complained to police that Wert had followed him, asked for his name and touched his thigh after suggesting they "hide" somewhere. Originally charged with a misdemeanor sex offense, Wert was convicted of simple assault after a two-day trial; he was sentenced to 15 days in jail and five years of probation. An appeals court upheld his conviction.

Yet Wert then lived with other Carmelites in Sarasota County and had access to a new Ford Mustang and the Internet, Widman said.

"They knew that and they had him on probation, and they had him on a house here in Venice and he was using that house to perpetrate abuse on one child and maybe others," Widman said.

Wert remains in the Sarasota County jail on $190,000 bond for 11 charges of sexual abuse against the Nokomis boy.

The boy is in the process of getting evaluation and treatment, Widman said.

Priest suspended

2011-03-31T10:26:00.000-07:00

http://www.euroweeklynews.com/2011033186506/news/mallorca/can-picafort-priest-suspended-for-child-abuse-allegations.html
Can Picafort priest suspended for child abuse allegations Mallorca

Thursday, 31 March 2011 15:25 0 Comments 0ABUSE ALLEGATIONS: A dark cloud over Can Picafort
THE Mallorca Bishopric has suspended the Can Picafort parish priest from his duties following accusations of alleged sexual abuse to minors. This was revealed by a report contained in the online version of Spanish daily, Diario de Mallorca which also wrote that an exhaustive internal investigation is being carried out into the accusations against by the Mallorca Church.

Pere Barcelo is accused of molesting young girls in and out of the island more than a decade ago. It has not been revealed if there are any cases of alleged abuse in recent years.

The Bishop of Mallorca, Jesus Murgui informed the priest the decision, prohibiting him from giving mass both in Can Picafort as in any other parish.

He was reported to the Guardia Civil mid 1998 by a Christian teacher who claimed that months earlier he caught Barcelo in the rectory allegedly abusing a 10-year-old girl.

The teacher also gave the authorities a list of names of children who corroborated the priest’s alleged abuse.

The Balearics Public Prosecutor shelved the case after a few months, but reported the case to the Bishop at the time, Teodor Ubeda, but seemingly no action was taken until a journalist, Mateu Ferrer, exposed the alleged acts in a television documentary last October.

This weekend, parish priests from the north of Mallorca are expected to meet to decide who will take over the now vacant parish.

Pastor jailed

2011-03-31T10:13:00.000-07:00

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/crime/pastor-jailed-for-fondling-boy-2258568.html
Pastor jailed for fondling boy

By Matthew Holehouse, PA

Thursday, 31 March 2011
An evangelical pastor who fondled a teenage boy while he slept and touched a young preacher while sharing a hotel bed has been jailed for eight months.

Dr Albert Odulele, 47, admitted indecently assaulting the boy and sexually assaulting the man during a hearing at Bexley Magistrates' Court on March 3.

Today at Woolwich Crown Court, in London, he was jailed for eight months and six months respectively, to run concurrently, and put on the sex offenders' register for five years.

The court heard how Odulele, founder of the Glory House International Pentecostal church, would frequently share hotel beds while travelling the world with a large entourage of security and pastors.

In around 2003, he was watching television with a boy over whom he had "assumed paternal influence".

When the boy fell asleep he put his hand in his underwear and fondled him. The boy said he did not know what to do and was too scared to move.

Odulele's wife was pregnant with their daughter at the time.

The boy was left "traumatised" and lost interest in academic work, before telling his mother about the abuse.

When confronted by the boy's mother in spring last year, Odulele fell to his knees, crying and apologising, prosecutor Tom Nicholson told the court.

In 2004, he touched the inner thigh of a pastor while sharing a bed with him and another man at the Dartford Bridge Hilton.

The man brushed off the advances of Odulele, the "guiding light and father figure" of the church, before being touched again, the court heard.

Mr Nicholson said a number of church members challenged Odulele about his behaviour and appealed to a bishop of the church - without success.

Sentencing him, His Honour Judge Charles Byers described the attacks as "opportunistic".

Judge Byers said: "You were a man in a position of trust who was well respected. People turned to you for advice and no doubt for comfort."

He added that Odulele was an "intelligent man" who would have known his behaviour "was wrong".

In a pre-sentencing report Odulele, a trained medical doctor, said: "I am ashamed of my behaviour as homosexuality is at odds with my religious beliefs."

"I am extremely distraught and upset at the hurt and distress I have caused the victims."

Craig Crosbie, defending, said Odulele, the son of a Nigerian civil servant who came to Britain in 1986, has no previous convictions.

Glory House International, based in east London, claims to have a congregation of 3,000 and branches in Leeds, Birmingham and Brazil.

At his height Odulele would preach to 140,000 people at a time in stadia in Africa and the United States, the prosecution said.

Odulele was a major figure in Christian evangelism.

Odulele initially denied the crimes but later admitted to police he had been "battling" with his sexuality for years.

Glory House International is a registered charity with a turnover of £2 million a year.

Priest's past

2011-03-31T07:13:00.000-07:00

http://www.bristolpress.com/articles/2011/03/31/news/doc4d93eec94439d873425785.txt
Priest in sex abuse settlement had varied ties to area

Thursday, March 31, 2011 9:35 AM EDT

By Lisa Backus
Staff Writer

A priest recently identified as part of a sexual abuse settlement led congregations in Bristol and Plainville for many years while also serving as a minister at a local high school.

According to papers filed in a Hartford court in 2009, the Archdiocese of Hartford approved a settlement of more than $20,000 for Jeff Libby, a 48-year-old former Bristol resident now incarcerated in Maine. Libby claims he was repeatedly abused by the Rev. Richard McGann in the 1970s.

McGann was pastor of St. Gregory the Great Church on Maltby Street in Bristol from 1975 to 1977, when the abuse allegedly occurred, court papers show. McGann went on to serve as a chaplain at Hartford Hospital and a pastoral minister at St. Paul High School before being assigned as pastor of Our Lady of Mercy Church in Plainville in 1987.

McGann was placed on administrative leave from Our Lady of Mercy in 2005, archdiocese spokesperson Maria Zone said, declining to comment on the settlement. While on administrative leave, McGann cannot perform the functions of a priest, such as serve communion. He has not been stripped of his status as a priest, Zone said.

The archdiocese does not know where McGann is now living, she said. Attempts to reach McGann on Wednesday were unsuccessful.

“It is the policy of the archdiocese not to comment on specific settlements,” Zone said in a prepared statement. “But it is important that the public know that the Archdiocese of Hartford is doing everything possible to keep our youth safe.”

The archdiocese now requires all clergy, staff and volunteers to complete a “safe environment” curriculum that includes background checks and sexual abuse awareness training, she said.

A woman who answered the phone Wednesday at St. Gregory, and another who answered at Our Lady of Mercy, declined comment. St. Paul High School Principal Cary Dupont, who attended the school as a student, Wednesday said he did not recall McGann and could not speak to the accusations.

Libby was about 12 years old when the abuse began, said his attorney in Maine, Richard Olson. Libby’s family lived in the Bristol area at the time, he said. Libby is serving a 60-year prison in Maine for drowning his grandfather more than 25 years ago. He was in denial about the abuse for years until he sought help while in prison, Olson said.

“Jeff’s position is that had a judge known about the situation he would have considered it a mitigating factor in sentencing,” Olson said. “Jeff has sought help from the archdiocese in Maine and Hartford in asking for a hearing on a reduction of the sentence, but they have been silent.”

The settlement and allegations came to light Monday during a news conference in Hartford held by David Clohessy, director of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests. The 10,000-member national organization works to publicly identify clergy or church employees who have been the subject of sexual abuse settlements or criminal charges, said Clohessy, explaining that he suffered abuse at the hands of a priest in the 1970s.

“We work to heal the wounded and protect the vulnerable,” he said Wednesday. “We are hoping to spare some other child the horror we went through.”

Clohessy learned of Libby’s allegations and the settlement about a month ago, he said. He traveled from St. Louis to stage the news conference about McGann and another in Bridgeport about three other Connecticut clergy staff members also accused of abuse. Based on figures provided by the Boston-based research group Bishopaccountability.org, Clohessy said there are 28 clerics publicly accused of child molestation in the Archdiocese of Hartford.

Olson said Libby unsuccessfully petitioned the Maine court for a clemency hearing last year. Libby will try again in the spring, he said.

Archdiocese officials and Clohessy said McGann’s whereabouts are unknown. Since the statute of limitations has run out, McGann can not be charged with a crime, Olson said.

“Here is a situation where the church won’t even try to make this right,” Olson said. “There is a time when a real pastoral leader stops looking at the liability and what the lawyers are saying and says, ‘What should I do?’ There are lots of things the church should be doing for Jeff Libby and others.”

Bethany Home

2011-03-31T07:08:00.000-07:00

http://www.irishexaminer.com/ireland/survivors-want-bethany-home-in-redress-scheme-149715.html

Survivors want Bethany Home in redress scheme
By Jennifer Hough

Wednesday, March 30, 2011

THE survivors of a Protestant home for unmarried mothers where more than 200 babies died have asked for the Government’s position on including it in the redress scheme.

Just last October, while in opposition, Junior Minister Kathleen Lynch said the Government must "do the decent thing and end this outrage".

The Bethany Survivors Group, headed by Derek Leinster, has fought for years to have the home recognised as a state-run institution, despite what it calls a "cover up" to exclude it from the Residential Institutions Redress Scheme.

According to Mr Leinster, the state is as culpable for scores of deaths and abuse that went on in the home as it is for similar Catholic Church-run institutions and this must be recognised.

The Bethany Home took in non-Catholic unmarried mothers, their children, along with prostitutes and women, including children, convicted of various crimes between 1922-72.

The campaign came to a head last year when it emerged that in the 1930s and 1940s, some 219 children died at the home and were buried in unmarked graves at Mount Jerome.

The campaign was backed by Labour’s Joe Costello and Kathleen Lynch, who is now the Junior Minister for Mental Health and Disability. Ms Lynch said the continued refusal of the Government to include former residents of the Bethany Homes and the Magdalene Laundries under the provisions of the redress scheme was a "running sore".

"Despite continual calls the Department of Education has refused again and again to allow these institutions to be included in the list of qualifying institutions. As a result, the survivors have been deprived of the opportunity of having their case heard and of obtaining some justice and redress for the abuse they suffered as young, innocent and vulnerable children."

Mr Leinster said he wanted to know if Labour was going to stick to its promise. "The Bethany Home is eminently qualified to be included in the redress schedule," he said.

"It is too late for the 219 Bethany children buried in unmarked graves, whose final resting spot in Mount Jerome Cemetery was discovered in 2010. It is not yet too late for those still living."

Read more: http://www.irishexaminer.com/ireland/survivors-want-bethany-home-in-redress-scheme-149715.html#ixzz1IBb1QTdf

Convicted predators

2011-03-31T06:58:00.000-07:00

http://www.theindychannel.com/news/27379057/detail.html
Convicted Predators Speak Frankly On Luring Young Victims

POSTED: 11:02 pm EDT March 30, 2011

MUNCIE, Ind. -- A handful of convicted sex offenders spoke frankly to 100 strangers Wednesday night in Muncie, with no questions off limits.

The workshop was a first-of-its-kind event put on by the Family Services Society to prevent future abuse, 6News' Tanya Spencer reported.

As offenders spoke candidly about the crimes that put them in jail, two of the panelists said they assaulted young girls they had just met. One abused his own daughter and another was a church mentor.

The offenders talked about how they justified their actions in their minds.

"I moan and gripe and complain about the children that are wearing pants that's got "sexy" (written) on the back. Why do you want to put a word on your 12-, 14- or 16-year-old daughter's butt? I mean, is that not trying to draw attention to her?" said one sex offender, who met his teenage victim online. He blamed pornography for fueling his addiction to sex.

All of the panelists agreed that they thought only of their own gratification during their crimes, never about the effect on their victims.Parents came to the workshop looking for answers.

"(I want) to see how these folks operate and get insight to see where I can stand to protect my own children," said Dwight Martin, a father of a 5-year-old.

"(I wanted) to make sure that I know what to look for to keep my kids safe," said Brandy Martin, Dwight's wife.

"I have three little children. I have a 4-year-old, a 1-year-old and a 3-month-old. That's my worst fear ever is that something awful like that could happen to them," said parent Sandrina Saintignon.

Counselors with the Family Services Society said unfortunately there's no known set of characteristics or personality traits that will help parents identify an offender. They also said that 90 percent of sexual abuse is committed by someone the victim knows and trusts.

The best advice from those who know best how to lure young victims is to talk to and listen to kids.

Let them know they're loved unconditionally and that they can share anything with you. Also, pay close attention to any change in their behavior.

"It (the sexual abuse) changed how she (his 13-year-old daughter) acted towards me," said one offender, "So, if you see a change toward a family member or friend, pay attention to it. Ask questions."

Experts said one in three girls and one in six boys will be molested in their lifetime.

Experts also said 88 percent of sexual abuse cases are never reported.

The Family Services Society has done panels like Wednesday's before for small groups, but this was the first that was open to the public.

Event organizers said they may offer more sessions in the future.

International conspiracy

2011-03-31T06:50:00.000-07:00

http://www.pressdemocrat.com/article/20110330/ARTICLES/110339929?Title=Molest-suit-From-Santa-Rosa-to-Dublin
Molest suit: From Santa Rosa to Dublin
Arcata man, 38, identifies himself as boyhood victim
By JEFF CHIU/Associated Press Greg Horne, right, listens as attorney Joseph George speaks about allegations of abuse by Father Patrick McCabe at a news conference in Burlingame on Wednesday.

By SAM SCOTT
THE PRESS DEMOCRAT

Published: Wednesday, March 30, 2011 at 3:00 a.m.
Last Modified: Wednesday, March 30, 2011 at 9:09 p.m.
( page all of 3 )

Four men who claim they were molested by a Humboldt County priest in the 1980s have dropped their case against the Catholic Diocese of Santa Rosa. But only so they can expand their target to include “an international conspiracy” that extends to Ireland, their attorneys said.

Related Links:Former Santa Rosa Diocese priest to appeal extradition to Ireland Former altar boy describes aftermath of alleged abuse by Eureka priest Eureka man says priest molested several children at a time Lawsuit: Humboldt man molested as a child by Santa Rosa Diocese priest Pedophile priest sent to North Coast in '80s The new suit will take aim not only the local diocese, but the Archdiocese of Dublin and the Catholic order that treated the priest for pedophilia, attorney Joseph George said Wednesday.

The legal action will allege negligence, fraud and conspiracy against leaders of the three organizations that helped transfer the Rev. Patrick McCabe from pulpits in Ireland to California despite knowing his deep problems.

A 2009 report commissioned by the Irish government said the Santa Rosa bishop at the time, the late Mark Hurley, accepted McCabe knowing he'd been treated for pedophilia at a Catholic facility in New Mexico.

McCabe served as priest in St. Bernard Parish in Eureka from 1983 to 1985 when he was removed after a complaint he had children sit on his knee during confession. He then served briefly at St. Elizabeth Parish in Guerneville before being removed as a priest in 1988. Local allegations against him surfaced last year after news of his arrest. The 75-year-old is being in held in an Alameda County jail pending extradition to Ireland to face charges of molesting six boys from 1973 to 1981.

Greg Horne, 38, of Arcata, identified himself publicly for the first time Wednesday as one of the four men involved in the case. He said he was stunned and numb after reading about McCabe's arrest and realizing his alleged crimes were part of a larger pattern.

When he was a boy, McCabe used to babysit him in the rectory while his mother worked bingo games in the Eureka church to help pay his tuition to Catholic school, he said. The priest took advantage of the time alone to fondle him and rub himself against him, he said.

“He knew he had a solid amount of time every single Wednesday and he could just take his time,” Horne said at a news conference in Burlingame arranged by his attorneys. “It was almost like a game to him.”

Lawyers for the Santa Rosa diocese claim there's no evidence of misconduct in McCabe's file and no evidence that Bishop Hurley was aware of it. Also, the statue of limitations for the allegations at the heart of the matter has expired. Claims of childhood sexual misconduct expire on a person's 26th birthday.

“The Court of Appeals has said, ‘I don't care what label you put on it, it's a claim for childhood sexual abuse, which is covered by this particular statute of limitations and that statute has run out,” said Adrienne Moran, an attorney for the Santa Rosa diocese.

The attorneys threatening to file the new case blame all parties, including the Servants of the Paraclete, the Catholic congregation that ran the clinic that treated McCabe. The lawyers said the treatment facility should have done more to stop him from resuming pastoral duties.

“It really is an international conspiracy,” said Jeff Anderson, a Minnesota attorney who joined the four men's team as one of the country's most active lawyers in clergy sexual abuse cases. “We have a well-documented evidentiary trail going back to Dublin. We also have international movement of a known offender by top officials from several entities.”

George said the new case would be filed next month in Sonoma County Superior Court and that Anderson was headed to Ireland this week to speak with more victims and attorneys to gather additional evidence. He said the shift in tactics was to bring action against all responsible parties, not just the local diocese. Additionally, he said much of the evidence for the case is in Dublin.

Horne, who said only that he works in law enforcement, said he's not concerned about winning money. He just wants to do his part from stopping it from happening again, which is why he reluctantly went public.

“There's not enough money printed in the world to buy back what I had taken,” Horne said.

Priest accused

2011-03-31T06:26:00.001-07:00

http://host.madison.com/wsj/news/local/crime_and_courts/article_50054090-5b10-11e0-b4ba-001cc4c002e0.html
Madison priest accused of sexual assault of girl
A Madison priest allegedly fondled a teenage girl in Stevens Point and at her Monona home in 2003 and 2004, then threatened to sue the girl and her cousin for slander to stop them from telling other people about the incidents, according to a criminal complaint filed Wednesday.

The Rev. Joseph Gibbs Clauder, 64, allegedly told the girl that if she told anyone else what he had done she would not go to heaven, and said nobody in her family would believe her, according to the complaint filed in Dane County Circuit Court.

She was 14 and 15 years old when the incidents are alleged to have happened. She said she did not reveal them until 2009, when she was 20, because she was afraid of Clauder, and even said she was afraid to go to heaven because he could be there.

"I never want to be near him," she told a nurse, her parish priest and family members in February 2009.

Clauder, who was removed from public life as a priest by the Madison Diocese in 1999 because of a separate allegation of sexual misconduct involving an adult woman, was charged with sexual assault of a child under the age of 16, a felony that carries a penalty of up to 40 years of combined prison and extended supervision.

Clauder is scheduled to appear in court on Thursday morning. Court records do not name a lawyer for Clauder, who does not have a listed telephone number. His former lawyer, Richard Auerbach, who is mentioned several times in the complaint, is on vacation and could not be reached for comment, his office said.

In his career Clauder was an associate priest at Immaculate Heart of Mary Parish in Monona, an associate priest at St. Dennis Parish in Madison and a chaplain at Madison General Hospital, renamed Meriter in 1987.

Madison Catholic Diocese spokesman Brent King said that after Clauder was removed from public ministry in 1999 he has had no role or assignment within the church but has been provided a retired priest's stipend.

In August, the diocese's sexual abuse review board found the girl's allegations to be "credible and probable," the complaint states. Bishop Robert Morlino referred the case to the Vatican, which told the diocese to proceed with a canonical trial, which will be pursued after the end of any criminal or civil trial against Clauder, the diocese said.

The diocese said police were not contacted after initially learning of the alleged sexual abuse because the victim was an adult and had said she wanted to handle it within the church.

Admin leave for 2 more priests

2011-03-31T06:02:00.000-07:00

http://www.beaumontenterprise.com/news/article/2-retired-priests-put-on-leave-by-Philly-diocese-1314817.php
2 retired priests put on leave by Philly diocese
PHILADELPHIA (AP) — The Archdiocese of Philadelphia has placed two retired priests on administrative leave, bringing to 23 the number of priests suspended following a scathing grand jury report that accused church officials of protecting predator priests.

Cardinal Justin Rigali placed the unidentified priests on leave Wednesday pending an investigation.

One priest retired in 2006 and has assisted at parishes in another diocese where he lives. That diocese has been informed of the suspension. The other priest retired in 2005 and is not serving in any public ministry.

Last month a grand jury blasted the diocese in a report that charged two priests, a former priest and a Catholic school teacher. A former high-ranking church official was also accused of transferring problem priests without warning anyone at their new parishes of sex-abuse complaints.
..

Read more: http://www.beaumontenterprise.com/news/article/2-retired-priests-put-on-leave-by-Philly-diocese-1314817.php#ixzz1IBKTpXFn

Compensation

2011-03-31T05:42:00.000-07:00

http://www.baltimoresun.com/features/sns-rt-life-us-belgium-abutre72t5ze-20110330,0,6780136.story
Belgian panel asks church to compensate abuse victims

Reuters

2:48 p.m. EDT, March 30, 2011

BRUSSELS (Reuters) - A Belgian parliamentary inquiry asked the Catholic Church Wednesday to compensate people who were abused by priests as children.

Widespread sexual abuse of minors by Belgian clerics has driven at least 13 people to suicide, a Church commission said last year.

"We recommend that the church puts in place an arbitration commission to be able to compensate the victims even if the facts are very old," said Lalieux Karine, the president of the inquiry. "It's money, but if they want a moral recognition they also can (ask for it)."

Belgium's lower house set up the inquiry to examine an issue that has rocked the Catholic Church across the world and resulted in hundreds of victims coming forward.

Earlier this month Germany's Catholic Church put forward a plan to compensate victims of sexual abuse by its priests, offering payments of up to 5,000 euros ($7,032) to those whose cases were too old to bring to court.

Pope Benedict met victims of abuse by priests during his April 2008 visit to the United States. The U.S. church has paid $2 billion in settlements to victims since 1992.

Teacher accused

2011-03-30T07:54:00.000-07:00

http://www.thespec.com/news/local/article/508903--cathedral-teacher-accused-of-attacking-student-in-empty-classroom
Cathedral teacher accused of attacking student in empty classroom
Cathedral Catholic...JGrazianoCathedral Catholic Secondary teacher Giuseppe Graziano faces sex assault charges arising from an attack on a student in an emplty school classroom
A Hamilton Catholic high school teacher has been charged with sexually assaulting a student.
Police allege Giuseppe (Joe) Graziano, who has been teaching cosmetology and Spanish at Cathedral High School for the past 14 years, approached a student at school in January and asked for sex.

Police and school officials would not reveal the student's gender, age or grade.

In February, according to the Hamilton police child abuse branch, Graziano sexually assaulted the student in an empty classroom.

Five hours after Graziano's arrest Tuesday morning, Hamilton Wentworth District Catholic School Board officials held a news conference at the central Hamilton high school.

"A student confided in a staff member on Feb. 9, " who brought the information to the principal's attention the next day, said HWCSB chairperson Pat Daly. Police were then contacted and Graziano was sent home immediately and placed on administrative leave. School officials also notified the Ontario College of Teachers.

Graziano was arrested and charged Tuesday around 10:30 a.m. after a joint investigation by police and the Catholic Children's Aid Society.

"This matter … is of deep concern to us and deeply saddens all of us beyond Cathedral and indeed our entire system, " Daly said. "Saying that, however, we respect due process and understand this is now a legal matter.

"Our first priority of concern is for the alleged victim and our prayers and support go out to that student."

While Cathedral students were praying unawares in a hastily called school assembly, school principal Sara Cannon broke the news of Graziano's arrest to his colleagues in a separate meeting.

"This is clearly deeply distressing … You can appreciate that this was shocking news to (staff). The wind has been knocked out of everyone, for sure, " Daly said.

At the end of the day, students were informed of the arrest by their teachers and given a letter to take home to their parents and caregivers.

"They were very shocked, " Cannon said.

"It took some time to absorb. Many of them were very quiet and many were in a pensive, reflective mood."

The school board brought crisis counsellors into the school for staff and students and will keep them at Cathedral as needed, Daly said.

Graziano, 51, of Stoney Creek, has been charged with two counts of invitation to sexual touching, sexual assault, and sexual interference.

Child abuse investigators believe there could be other victims. Anyone with further information is asked to call Detective Brandi Frazier at 905-546-3855.

"If a child came home with any concerns regarding this issue in any way, (parents) should contact Mrs. Cannon and/or police, " Daly said.

No contest

2011-03-30T07:48:00.000-07:00

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/ap/tx/7497272.html
Dallas-area priest pleads no contest to assault
© 2011 The Associated Press
March 30, 2011, 8:11AM
[X]ROWLETT, Texas — A Dallas-area priest has been put on probation after pleading no contest to misdemeanor assault over the inappropriate touching of a 14-year-old girl.

The Dallas Morning News reported Wednesday that the Rev. Bob Crisp had been a priest at Sacred Heart Catholic Church in Rowlett for a decade. The 62-year-old priest was put on leave last April.

Crisp pleaded no contest Tuesday in Rowlett Municipal Court and received six months of deferred adjudication, plus was fined $650 over the summer 2009 incident. He could not immediately be reached for comment.

Investigators say Crisp slipped off his shoe and rubbed his bare foot on the girl's leg, while complimenting her pedicure and her footwear, in an incident near the church.

A diocese spokeswoman says there are no plans to reassign Crisp.

Crimes concealed

2011-03-30T05:51:00.000-07:00

http://mnsnap.wordpress.com/snap-wisconsin/
New court documents:

Marquette University President Fr. Robert Wild left nation’s most prominent priest pedophile in ministry

As Jesuit provincial between 1985 to 1991, Wild concealed Fr. Donald McGuire’s criminal history, left him unsupervised

McGuire, prosecuted in Wisconsin and now in Federal prison, went on to molest children for another decade

Group again urging Jesuits officials to “come clean” about their child molesting clerics

WHAT: At a sidewalk news conference survivors of childhood sexual abuse by clergy will release and discuss new secret church documents that show that Fr. Robert Wild, President of Marquette University, concealed the crimes of Fr. Donald McGuire during his tenure as Provincial of the Chicago Province of the Society of Jesus (the Jesuits). After remarks survivors will attempt to hand deliver a letter to Fr. Robert Wild urging him to:

–publically apologize to victims of pedophile priest Fr. Donald McGuire and their families for his failure to remove McGuire from the priesthood, report McGuire to the police, and alert the public of McGuire’s criminal history against children,

–provide to the Marquette community, to Catholics and the public, a detailed account of his involvement, and those of his colleagues in the Chicago Province, in the decades long cover up of Fr. Donald McGuire’s sexually abusive history and the withholding of key documents to law enforcement officials during McGuire’s 2006 Wisconsin prosecution,

–Join victim/survivors and insist that Jesuit officials immediately create a public registry of all Jesuits in the Wisconsin, Chicago and other provinces who have substantiated reports of sexual abuse of children.

WHO: 3-4 members of SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, the world’s oldest and largest support group for clergy abuse victims, including the group’s longtime Midwest Director.

WHERE: Outside the entrance of Zilber Hall, Marquette University, 1250 W. Wisconsin Avenue, Milwaukee

WHEN: Wednesday, March 30, 11:30 a.m.

DOCUMENTS: The complete Jesuit and court documents, along with victim testimony, will be posted on the Boston based online research archive, BishopAccoutability.org at this link: Jesuits and Donald McGuire SJ A Management History

WHY: A new child sex abuse lawsuit filed in Chicago yesterday containing hundreds of never before seen church documents and depositions of top Jesuit officials, including current Marquette University President Fr. Robert Wild, show a pattern and practice of four decades of cover up by the Jesuit order concerning one of the nation’s most infamous pedophile priests.

The Jesuits are the largest Catholic religious order in the world, their high schools and universities some of the most elite educational institutions in the United States.

The priest whose child sex crimes Wild is shown to have concealed in the new documents is Fr. Donald McGuire, one of the most infamous priest sex offenders in US history. According to the documents, McGuire, now age 80, was known by Jesuit officials to have sexually assaulted children or been engaged in sexual misconduct for almost four decades. During this time, McGuire skyrocketed to fame as a spiritual advisor to Mother Theresa and the nuns of her international religious order.

In 2006, McGuire was found guilty of multiple counts of child sex assault in Walworth County, Wisconsin. In 2009 he was convicted on federal charges in Illinois for taking children across state and international boundaries to sexually assault them. Today McGuire is serving a 25 year sentence.

Wild, currently the President of Marquette University, served as the head of the Chicago Province of the Society of Jesus, or Jesuits from 1985 to 1991, during which time he assumed responsibility for McGuire and other Jesuit sex offenders.

When Wild assumed responsibility for McGuire in 1985, the Jesuits had already documented numerous reports of sexually assaulting children and sexual misconduct by McGuire spanning nearly 20 years. Not only had McGuire been secretly fired from two posts, including Loyola Preparatory Academy in Chicago, when Wild became his direct supervisor, McGuire had just been banned permanently from working or living in the archdiocese of Los Angeles and returned to Chicago.

While under Wild’s supervision, McGuire continued his prolific criminal assaults of children, unabated, recruiting victims from devout Catholic families from Illinois and around the United States. McGuire, a leading Jesuit retreat master, frequently used the Catholic confessional practice to commit his crimes, and his connection with Mother Theresa to gain the trust and confidence of scores of devout and unsuspecting parents and youngsters.

Wild assigned McGuire to Canisius House, a Jesuit community in Evanston Illinois in 1987, despite his sexual abuse history, where McGuire launched his worldwide retreat ministry, traveling the world unsupervised, often accompanied by children.

In 1991 Wild received a report from Brother Ricardo Palacio, a retreat director in California, who was alarmed that McGuire was conducting a youth retreat at his center and concerned about inappropriate behavior with a youngster. Wild, according to the testimony under oath by Palacio, informed Palacio by phone that the Jesuits had previous reports on McGuire’s sexual misconduct with children.

Despite Palacio’s testimony, Wild said in a 2009 deposition that there were no documents concerning McGuire in his Jesuit file and that he created his own “confidential” file for McGuire in 1991. Court documents support Palacio’s and not Wild’s claim.

This is not the first time Jesuit officials may have mislead the courts about abuse documents in McGuire’s file. During McGuire’s Wisconsin prosecution in 2006, Jesuit attorneys wrote Walworth County District Attorney Phil Koss that “we have very little with respect to Father McGuire, failing to mention any of the thousands of pages of documents that the Jesuits possessed directly related to allegations reported against McGuire over a period of 40 years.

Although Wild suggested to McGuire he stop traveling with children for “his prudent protection,” a suggestion McGuire obviously ignored, at no time did Wild report McGuire to police, warn parents or families of McGuire’s history, conduct or order a Jesuit investigation into McGuire’s behavior. As a result, McGuire went on to sexually assault more children for at least another decade.

SNAP official last week in Milwaukee released documents showing that another Jesuit priest with a prior history of sexual misconduct, Fr. Perry Robinson, had only last month been secretly removed from ministry. The group, which charge the Jesuits with an “appalling lack of transparency and accountability” concerning sex offenders like Robinson and McGuire, will be calling on Wild directly to join them in urging a “new era” of openness and public safety” by immediately publishing a registry of all known Jesuit sex offenders. The Jesuits have released no information concerning the number, identities, or current and past assignment histories of clerics who have assaulted children.

Wild will be retiring as Marquette’s President later this year.

Suicide

2011-03-30T05:41:00.000-07:00

http://delcotimes.com/articles/2011/03/29/news/doc4d929db427716818668865.txt
.Archdiocese to be hit with another abuse suit
Published: Tuesday, March 29, 2011

0diggsdigg ShareThis2By Patti Mengers, pmengers@delcotimes.com
The family of a Bucks County man who claims he committed suicide after Archdiocese of Philadelphia officials dismissed his allegation of clerical sexual abuse is expected to file a wrongful death suit against the archdiocese today.

The family alleges the man, who was 36 when he died, was molested by the Rev. Joseph Gallagher while he was an altar boy at St. Mark parish in Bristol, Bucks County. Gallagher served as assistant pastor at the former St. Michael's Church in Chester from June 1970 until October 1974.

Now retired, Gallagher was last listed by archdiocesan officials as pastor emeritus at St. Richard parish in Northeast Phialdelphia since October 2006. He is currently relieved of his priestly duties and living in a private residence while an archdiocesan team led by former Philadelphia Assistant District Attorney Gina Maisto Smith, reviews the sexual abuse allegations.

He was among 24 priests suspended last month by archdiocesan officials after they were mentioned as suspects in a Philadelphia grand jury report on clerical sexual abuse of children. The grand jury accused archdiocesan officials of downplaying at least two complaints that Gallagher molested boys including one identified as "Ben" whose family is expected to file the wrongful death suit. His family maintains that Ben committed suicide after archdiocesan officials dismissed his abuse allegations that he made to them in 2007.

Attorneys in the case are Dan Monhan of Chester County and Marci Hamilton of Bucks County who are working in conjunction with Jeff Anderson, an internationally-known expert in sexual abuse litigation based in St. Paul, Minn. They are also representing Frank Finnegan of Collingdale in a lawsuit against archdiocesan officials in connection with alleged abuse when he was a boy at St. Francix Xavier parish, Philadelphia, by the now-late Rev. John Kline.

The recent grand jury investigation, that was launched by District Attorney Seth Williams, resulted in the Feb. 10 arrest of two priests, one former priest and a former Catholic school lay teacher for sexually assaulting two boys in the Archdiocese of Philadelphia. Also arrested for endangering the welfare of children was the Rev. Monsignor William Lynn, who, as secretary of the clergy under the former Philadelphia archbishop, Cardinal Anthony Bevilacqua, was responsible for investigating clerical sexual abuse. He is reportedly the highest ranking U.S. church official ever charged with child endangerment.
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By Patti Mengers, pmengers@delcotimes.com

The family of a Bucks County man who claims he committed suicide after Archdiocese of Philadelphia officials dismissed his allegation of clerical sexual abuse is expected to file a wrongful death suit against the archdiocese today.

The family alleges the man, who was 36 when he died, was molested by the Rev. Joseph Gallagher while he was an altar boy at St. Mark parish in Bristol, Bucks County. Gallagher served as assistant pastor at the former St. Michael's Church in Chester from June 1970 until October 1974.

Now retired, Gallagher was last listed by archdiocesan officials as pastor emeritus at St. Richard parish in Northeast Phialdelphia since October 2006. He is currently relieved of his priestly duties and living in a private residence while an archdiocesan team led by former Philadelphia Assistant District Attorney Gina Maisto Smith, reviews the sexual abuse allegations.

He was among 24 priests suspended last month by archdiocesan officials after they were mentioned as suspects in a Philadelphia grand jury report on clerical sexual abuse of children. The grand jury accused archdiocesan officials of downplaying at least two complaints that Gallagher molested boys including one identified as "Ben" whose family is expected to file the wrongful death suit. His family maintains that Ben committed suicide after archdiocesan officials dismissed his abuse allegations that he made to them in 2007.

Attorneys in the case are Dan Monhan of Chester County and Marci Hamilton of Bucks County who are working in conjunction with Jeff Anderson, an internationally-known expert in sexual abuse litigation based in St. Paul, Minn. They are also representing Frank Finnegan of Collingdale in a lawsuit against archdiocesan officials in connection with alleged abuse when he was a boy at St. Francix Xavier parish, Philadelphia, by the now-late Rev. John Kline.

The recent grand jury investigation, that was launched by District Attorney Seth Williams, resulted in the Feb. 10 arrest of two priests, one former priest and a former Catholic school lay teacher for sexually assaulting two boys in the Archdiocese of Philadelphia. Also arrested for endangering the welfare of children was the Rev. Monsignor William Lynn, who, as secretary of the clergy under the former Philadelphia archbishop, Cardinal Anthony Bevilacqua, was responsible for investigating clerical sexual abuse. He is reportedly the highest ranking U.S. church official ever charged with child endangerment.

Will they ever change?

2011-03-30T05:24:00.000-07:00

http://www.alternet.org/news/150425/new_sex_abuse_scandals_plague_catholic_institutions_--_will_the_church_ever_change
New Sex Abuse Scandals Plague Catholic Institutions -- Will the Church Ever Change?
Why do these abuses keep popping up even after earnest vows of reform from the church?
March 29, 2011 |
Fact file a US priest accused of molesting 200 children, and the Vatican's actions after it received complaints in the 1990s while the current pope was head of the Catholic Church's morals watchdog. The pedophile priest crisis has cost the Roman Catholic church nearly $3 billion in the US, but only a fraction of the perpetrators have been jailed and little done to punish those who covered it up.Photo Credit: AFP/Graphic - Martin Megino/Gal/Js LIKE THIS ARTICLE ?
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TAKE ACTIONPetitions by Change.org|Get Widget|Start a Petition � It’s been years since the massive wave of Catholic clergy-abuse stories began to break, with victims speaking out and horrors uncovered. It’s true that instances of traumatizing sexual and physical abuse from clergy in many other religions and denominations have surfaced in the ensuing years, proving that the problem is hardly endemic to one religion or group of people. But in Catholic strongholds where abuse was widespread, the problem has been systemic, and the coverup attempts by the church are egregious and often premeditated and coordinated. Centralized hierarchies have led to centralized denial--until recent years, when there has been a centralized attempt to clean house.

Nowadays, the subject of child abuse by the clergy is often one broached by standup comedians and cynics. A disconnect is growing between the American Catholic church and its followers, and not just on this issue: study after study shows that Catholic laypeople are aligned with the rest of the American population--and against the church--when it comes to “social issues” abortion, especially birth control (which a vast majority use, directly countering church doctrine) and now even gay marriage.

Yet the clergy abuse stories continue to unfold in the arenas of church politics, law enforcement and the religious landscape. The last big scandal was in Wisconsin, when abuse at a school for the deaf was revealed, and more have surfaced since.

Just this week a record financial settlement was reached with abuse victims in the Northwest, while the Philadelphia abuse scandal continued. Last Friday alone, the New York Times published three separate stories about Catholic clergy abuse cases; a Google news search for “Catholic priest abuse” revealed ongoing or recently concluded cases in Connecticut, California, Tennessee and the Midwest--and these are just domestic cases. In Ireland, the entire nation remains up in arms about a “smoking gun” document which revealed, essentially, that the coverup of abuses there was sanctioned by the Vatican.

And that culture of denial and collusion that has been so slow to change may explain why these stories keep popping up even after earnest vows of reform from the church. A system that worked for decades one way may not be able to transform overnight--particularly when many of the power dynamics remain the same.

The Philly 21

Two Times stories were related to the unfolding case in Philadelphia, in which a grand jury found that “ the archdiocese allowed 37 priests accused of abuse or inappropriate behavior to remain in ministry.” As a result, a few weeks ago the church suspended 21 clergy or teachers now being referred to by some as “the Philly 21” or “the Philadelphia 21.”

This was after a new system of “review” boards had been implemented by the church (in the wake of other scandals) to root out exactly this kind of problem. But the review boards, staffed by outsiders with experience in law enforcement and accountable to church authorities, found no problem in Philadelphia even where the legal system found many.

A criminal proceeding is beginning against several church officials, including a monsignor, two priests, one former priest, and a former school teacher under the parochial purview:

“The priests and the schoolteacher are already accused of rape; the monsignor, William Lynn, the highest-ranking official to be accused of a crime in the three-decade-long abuse scandal in the United States, is suspected of covering up rape by the priests and is charged with child endangerment.”

One of the stories in the Times described a “blistering courtroom session” at a preliminary hearings for the case, at which the monsignor was repeatedly told by the judge that it could jeopardize his own interest to have a defense team sponsored by the archdiocese itself--which would have a vested interest not in him, but in the church. Nonetheless, he insisted on retaining that defense.

A second article about the Philadelphia case on Friday examined whether this spreading scandal proved that the work many American ecclesiastical authorities had put in establishing their own review protocols was in vain, if such internal reviews simply couldn’t pick up on the abuse. Supposedly, a new “zero tolerance” era had been launched after the Boston Diocese debacle at the beginning of this decade. But the fact that these review boards have no legal subpoena power and can only use documents and evidence that is voluntarily handed to them of course, is a huge part of the problem.

Northwest Nightmare

On Friday another case came to a close. This time it was a less recent one--a Jesuit order in the Northwest settled a longstanding case for $166 million against a group of nearly 500 abuse victims, mostly from the disadvantaged and vulnerable group of Alaskan and American natives, many of whom were orphans. The abuse took place decades ago. It has been strongly implied by victim’s advocate groups, the Times reported, that the remoteness of some of the parishes and schools and the socially isolated position of the students and families there meant that “problem priests” were shipped to the area to be out of people’s way, with little regard to the potential victims awaiting them there.

Attorney Blaine Tamaki gave a sharp statement to reporters, pointing out that the financial payout and the number of victims makes this a record-setting settlement--hardly a memorable milestone for the church.

"The $166.1 million is the largest settlement by a religious order in the history of the world. Over 450 Native American children ... were sexually abused repeatedly, from rape to sodomy, for decades throughout the Northwest,” Tamaki told the press, according to CNN. “Instead of teaching these children how to read and write, Jesuit priests were teaching them distrust and shame. Instead of teaching the Native American children the love of God, these Jesuit pedophile priests were molesting these young children.”

Why?

In the last decade, many have speculated that the Catholic attitude toward sex (only for procreation, not for pleasure), sin and repentance and the celibacy requirement for clergy are a source of the problem. But it’s impossible to generalize or to pinpoint the cause. Instead what can be said is that in order for abuses of power to end, conceptions and distribution of power needs to change--particularly in a system which is hierarchical and authority-based and the ultimate authority is theoretically derived from a divine source. It's no coincidence that many of the abuse victims were poor or alone or unable in some way to fight back, and that their abusers had a vast network of resources behind them.

This heartfelt search for answers from Maureen Martinez, a Catholic woman in Philadelphia goes over all the doctrinal possibilities, the issue of celibacy, of mentally ill men hoping to find shelter in the church as priests, and settles at last on the core problem of power:

“And this is the heart of the issue with the church: Offenders feel they are invincible. And their higher-ups who covered up the crimes also feel they are invincible. In fact, one could argue that the bishops and cardinals who knowingly shuffled sex offenders from one parish to another are even more at fault. They are not mentally ill.”

Undetected

2011-03-30T05:11:00.000-07:00

http://www.npr.org/2011/03/29/134953417/how-priests-accused-of-abuse-can-go-undetected
How Priests Accused Of Abuse Can Go Undetected
by Barbara Bradley Hagerty

March 29, 2011

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Matt Rourke/AP
Catherine Coleman Murphy, of Lansdale, Pa., and Jack Wintermyer, of Silver Spring, Md., protest outside Cathedral Basilica of Saints Peter and Paul in Philadelphia the day after the Philadelphia archdiocese suspended 21 priests who were named by a grand jury as child molestation subjects.

Matt Rourke/AP Catherine Coleman Murphy, of Lansdale, Pa., and Jack Wintermyer, of Silver Spring, Md., protest outside Cathedral Basilica of Saints Peter and Paul in Philadelphia the day after the Philadelphia archdiocese suspended 21 priests who were named by a grand jury as child molestation subjects.
text size A A A March 29, 2011 A couple of years ago, the Philadelphia archdiocese heard about three priests who had allegedly raped two boys. It gave the priests' files to law enforcement, and a grand jury began to investigate. Then, the grand jury stumbled on a bombshell. A church employee testified that there were many other priests the panel should know about.

"The grand jury found that a policy of zero tolerance was not actually in effect," says District Attorney Seth Williams, "and that there were many priests that had allegations made against them that were still in active ministry."

There were 37 priests, according to a scathing report by the grand jury, which was released last month. Shaken by accusations that it was trying to keep abusers in ministry without telling parishes, the archdiocese moved quickly: It hired Gina Maisto Smith, a former prosecutor with a specialty in child sex abuse cases, to investigate further. The church soon put 21 clergy on administrative leave.

Smith is unable to speak to the specific cases, but she says she has seen no evidence that church officials intentionally protected sexual predators.

"I can say with clarity that I saw the archdiocese doing what it could do within the systems that it had and making the best decisions they could under the circumstances," she says.

This raises the question: With all the safeguards the Roman Catholic Church put into place after the sex abuse scandal in 2002, how could this happen? If the archdiocese was following all the right procedures, how did these priests fall through the cracks?

Ways To Fall

It turns out that there's a lot of play in the rules, says Terry McKiernan, president of Bishop Accountability.org, a watchdog group. He says when an allegation comes in the church, the bishop doesn't have to pursue it very far.

"A bishop may decide at a very early stage that an allegation is without merit," he says. "And if he does that, we never even get to the stage of a priest being removed."

Enlarge
Matt Rourke/AP
Archbishop of Philadelphia Cardinal Justin Rigali, who suspended the priests named in the grand jury's report, said he was "truly sorry" for harm done to victims and members of the community for "this great evil and crime."

Matt Rourke/AP Archbishop of Philadelphia Cardinal Justin Rigali, who suspended the priests named in the grand jury's report, said he was "truly sorry" for harm done to victims and members of the community for "this great evil and crime."
McKiernan says he believes that's what happened in Philadelphia. He notes that the archdiocese forwarded only seven of the 21 cases to its review board, a panel of lay people who are supposed to hear every allegation of sexual abuse and act to protect the victims. Often, he says, the review board "doesn't know all the facts" because it is the bishop or his senior officials who decide which cases to present to the board.

Moreover, McKiernan and others say review boards sometimes "hold their punches" because they are handpicked by the bishop. In fact, the grand jury report excoriated the Philadelphia review board because it rejected every allegation it did hear as "unsubstantiated."

Philadelphia may not be alone, says William Gavin, a former FBI agent who was hired by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops to audit each of the 195 Catholic dioceses each year and make sure they're preventing and reporting sex abuse cases. "It was an audit in quotes," he says. "I think it was more of a program review than anything else."

Gavin says he could ask whether a diocese is conducting background checks on priests and employees — but he was not allowed to look at records that would indicate whether there were any allegations against a priest.

"We didn't have the benefit of drilling down into personnel files to see what might be there," Gavin says. "They were off limits."

Gavin and his auditors had to depend on a bishop's word about whether anyone had been accused of abuse. In addition, the questionnaire they use wouldn't have spotted the Philadelphia 21 anyway. It only asks about allegations within the past year, not older cases.

Independent Reviews

Some believe the only way to get real answers is to have an outsider look at the priests' files.

"The only reason we know about this situation in Philadelphia is because a grand jury report has been issued, and a grand jury process has been looking at this archdiocese for years," McKiernan says. "I think if we had that kind of aggressive law enforcement in other dioceses, the same problems would be revealed."

McKiernan says they already have. In Cleveland, for example, the diocese said that 28 priests had been accused of abuse, but when a prosecutor looked at the files, the estimate went to 145.
When the New Hampshire attorney general looked at the files of the diocese of Manchester, 27 new names emerged.

And McKiernan has obtained an internal 2009 document from the Boston archdiocese that says there were 40 credibly accused priests whose names are still unknown to the public.

Even critics say that most dioceses are trying to do their best at protecting victims and still giving due process to priests who may have been wrongly accused. And that can be a difficult line to walk.

"Many people think the archdiocese doesn't get it," says Donna Farrell, a spokesperson for the archdiocese of Philadelphia. "We do. And the task, the job ahead of us, is to recognize where we've fallen short — and to let our actions speak to our resolve."

The faithful will surely be watching — and so will prosecutors.

Grand Jury Report

2011-03-30T05:01:00.000-07:00

http://www.bishop-accountability.org/reports/2003_09_25_First_Philadelphia_Grand_Jury_Report.pdf

3rd report

2011-03-30T04:44:00.000-07:00

http://washingtonexaminer.com/news/2011/03/victims-group-releases-3rd-report-priest-abuse
Victims group releases 3rd report on priest abuse
By: The Associated Press 03/29/11 2:46 PM
The Associated Press
By: AP Photo/Matt Rourke
Barbara Blaine, President of Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP), displays childhood photographs of adults who say they were sexually abused, during a news conference Tuesday, March 29, 2011, in Philadelphia. The national victims group SNAP has released a previously undisclosed grand jury report on sexually abusive priests in Philadelphia.
The national victims group SNAP has released a previously undisclosed grand jury report on sexually abusive priests in Philadelphia.
The Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests says the 2003 document affirms what two later grand juries found: that abusive Roman Catholic priests were protected and transferred among parishes.
She says it's an interim report from a grand jury whose 18-month time limit had expired. A second grand jury continued the investigation; it released a scathing 2005 report that includes material from the 2003 document.
Another grand jury report this year led to criminal charges against three priests and others.
The Philadelphia Archdiocese declined comment due to a gag order.

Read more at the Washington Examiner: http://washingtonexaminer.com/news/2011/03/victims-group-releases-3rd-report-priest-abuse#ixzz1I59fpsdy

RtP

2011-03-30T04:13:00.000-07:00

http://www.americamagazine.org/blog/entry.cfm?blog_id=2&entry_id=4067RtP in the church
Posted at: Tuesday, March 29, 2011 02:10:28 PM
Author: Kevin Clarke

I spoke of the responsibility to protect at the international level in the preceding post. The sorry tale of Father Donald Maguire, S.J., recounted in today's NY Times, depicts a profound failure of RtP at a smaller scale (albeit one no less devastating to the victims described here). What else can be said about such things that haven't already be said? To read this tale as a parent and try to imagine the thinking of the administrators of this dangerous man who persisted in discounting the damage he was capable of inflicting and in ignoring decades of warning signs and malevolent behavior . . . it is beyond mind-boggling. Discouraging vocations among gay men has become the preferred focus for "fixing" this problem of abuse, but chasing gay men away from or out of the priesthood won't do anything to correct the institutional failures and almost pathological nonchalance and indifference described here in the handling of a monster like Maguire and too many like him (oh, and good luck managing the church without its many gay priests).

From the NY Times:

Jesuit leaders in Chicago largely ignored or kept secret numerous reports, spanning four decades, that a prominent priest was sexually abusing teenage boys, lawyers for victims charged on Monday in a motion for punitive damages in a Chicago court.

Included in the motion were more than 65 recently obtained church documents and depositions that, the lawyers said, demonstrated “a reckless disregard for the safety of others in the face of repeated reports of sexual misconduct” on the part of Chicago Jesuit leaders.

The former priest, Donald J. McGuire, now 80, was convicted on several counts of sex abuse in state and federal courts in 2006 and 2008, and is serving a 25-year federal sentence.

The newly public documents date from the early 1960s, when a concerned Austrian priest, in imperfect English, first observed in a letter to Chicago Jesuits that Father McGuire, newly ordained and studying in Europe, had “much relations with several boys.” The reports extend into the last decade, when Father McGuire reportedly ignored admonitions to stop traveling with young assistants, molesting one as late as 2003, as law enforcement was closing in. The legal motion argues that Father McGuire’s superiors in Chicago turned “a blind eye to his criminal actions.”

You can read the rest here, if you have the stomach for it, but you can probably guess the rest at this point.

Schools

2011-03-30T03:57:00.000-07:00

http://www.irishcentral.com/news/Catholic-church-to-lose-stronghold-on-Irish-education-system-118832599.html
Catholic church to lose stronghold on Irish education system
Church patronage of schools to undergo over haul

Published Tuesday, March 29, 2011, 8:21 AMUpdated Tuesday, March 29, 2011, 8:21 AM

i<( <

Crucifix hanging on a classroom wall - The Church may soon have no place in Irish schools
Photo by Google Images
READ MORE- The Irish are fast losing their religion say experts

READ MORE - Irelands Census 2011 and Catholicism - the demise of organized religion in Ireland

Ireland’s Minister for Education, Ruairí Quinn, has established an expert group to examine how the majority of primary schools will be moved from Catholic Church patronage.

The minister has said he wants more than 50 percent of the Ireland’s schools currently under Church patronage to move to an alternative guardianship.

The Catholic church controls about 90 percent of the State’s 3,200 primary schools.

Professor John Coolahan, from the National University of Maynooth will chair the forum, which will have its first meeting this coming May.

Dr Coolahan will be supported by Fionnuala Kilfeather, former chief executive of the National Parents' Council, and Dr Caroline Hussey, former registrar and deputy president at UCD.

The working group will advice the new minister on a range of issues to ensure that primary schools in Ireland can cater for all religions, as well as the practicalities of how to transfer patronage.

The forum will also include input from various patronage bodies, Irish Primary Principals' Network, the Irish National Teachers Organization and other stakeholders including parents. It will also take submissions from the public.

"This forum is really to discuss the mechanisms and modality whereby a school under patronage of one body – let’s say the Catholic Church - would come to an orderly decision to transfer that patronage to another patron body in a manner that does not damage the educational experience of the children or indeed the operational or working arrangements of the teachers and parents involved,” he told RTÉ radio yesterday.

READ MORE- The Irish are fast losing their religion say experts

READ MORE - Irelands Census 2011 and Catholicism - the demise of organized religion in Ireland

More abuse

2011-03-29T09:31:00.000-07:00

http://bilgrimage.blogspot.com/2011/03/questions-continue-to-arise-post.html
Questions Continue to Arise, Post-Philadelphia, As New Abuse Stories Break

Several good overviews in recent days of the questions we're left with after Philadelphia, where it has become apparent that a significant number of priests credibly accused of abuse have been left in active ministry, despite assurances of the U.S. bishops that we now have a well-functioning system in place to remove such priests from ministry:

As Laurie Goodstein and Tom Roberts report recently in the New York Times and National Catholic Reporter, the Philadelphia news, and the indictment of that archdiocese's secretary for clergy Msgr. William Lynn on charges of endangering the welfare of children, come as a shock to many U.S. Catholics, since we've been told by the bishops that the abuse situation is a thing of the past, that it's under control. Among the questions Goodstein and Roberts report American Catholics are now asking (and have to ask), post-Philadelphia:

1. Do the review boards set up by dioceses to review allegations of clerical abuse of minors receive all pertinent information from diocesan clergy files? Are files scrubbed of some information before they reach reviewers' hands?

2. Since the annual audit completely missed the 37 priests in the Philadelphia archdiocese who have apparently continued in ministry despite credible allegations of abuse of minors, is the audit system functioning? Is there any assurance that auditors have access to all information they need in every diocese to do their job?

3. How are review boards selected, and what independence do they actually have from diocesan control as they do their review work?

4. Are all the standards and norms of the 2002 Dallas charter actually being applied uniformly in dioceses across the nation?

5. And--to me, most ominous of all--how many other situations like Philadelphia are still out there?

In my opinion (and I've linked to a statement of Peter Isely of SNAP suggesting this--see here), Philadelphia is not unique. On a daily basis, new indicators come out of an abysmal lack of accountability and transparency among the pastoral leaders of American Catholicism, vis-a-vis the abuse crisis. Two examples from the past day or so:

It was announced yesterday that St. John's Benedictine Abbey in Minnesota has just reached a settlement with nine victims of abuse at its St. John's Prep School in Collegeville. The abuse situation at St. John's has been in the public eye for some years now. Several years ago, Patrick Marker, who was abused as a teen at the prep school, created a website to track what has happened at St. John's, and to make it known to the public. The website, Behind the Pine Curtain, does outstanding work gathering information about St. John's Abbey and the abuse situation at this institution, and making that information available to the public.

Marker served for several years on an external review board at St. John's, and then resigned when, as he indicates, the abbey's abbot withheld information on credibly accused monks from the public and other board members supported this action. And as he maintains now that a settlement has just been reached with some victims of abuse by members of this monastic community, the problem of a lack of transparency and accountability remains, in his view, even with this settlement:

What they're doing is reacting. They haven't been active in addressing this problem. Names that they knew back in 2002 were not part of the public release back then. The external review board that they created as part of that 2002 settlement was a farce. And I was very hopeful in 2002 that we would see change and that St. John's would turn the corner. It didn't happen.

That's one alarming indicator from very recent news which suggests to me that the Philadelphia story is hardly unique--that there continue to be many situations within the American Catholic church in which a refusal of pastoral officials to behave pastorally, to be transparent and accountable re: abuse cases, still hampers the attempts of American Catholics to address the abuse crisis.

And here's another: just yesterday, a poster commenting on this blog, Augusta Wynn, logged in to say that the Corapi story reminded her of the story of another rock-star priest given free rein to roam the globe as he provided spiritual direction to various religious communities, including Mother Teresa's community. The priest to whom Wynn is referring is Jesuit Fr. Donald McGuire, who, according to Wynn, brought in much money for his community's coffers, and may have had unusual latitude to pursue his ministry (which was dogged for years by persistent credible reports of abuse of teenaged boys) because he was a cash cow for the Jesuits.

And immediately after this blogger alerted me to the story of Donald McGuire, about which I knew nothing, news began to break about a case filed against him yesterday, which claims that the Jesuits long knew of McGuire's abuse of minors, and did little to curb the abuse or protect minors McGuire targeted. Erik Erickholm reports on this case today in the New York Times, and the Bishop-Accountability site has just uploaded an important cache of documents tracking the Jesuit cover-up (for years) of McGuire's abuse.

The common thread of these two very recent post-Philadelphia stories? It's still going on. The cover-up continues. There is still a shocking lack of accountability among the pastoral leaders of American Catholicism, vis-a-vis abuse of minors. Clericalism--the belief that priests attain some ontologically superior status through ordination, which sets them above common lay Catholics and gives them power and privilege that flow from the change in their ontological status effected by ordination--remains front and center in all of these breaking stories of abuse.

And it's everywhere. It's not only in Philadelphia. It runs throughout the Catholic church in the U.S.

And it's still enabled by far too many American Catholics, some of whom have logged into this blog in recent days to slam open discussion of how clericalism and the adulation of rock-star priests feed the abuse situation and its cover-up, and who have suggested we need to shut up, stop our idiotic yammering, and pray, pay, and keep obeying.

And so, for me, another of the questions to be added to the list of questions the Philadelphia story raises is this: how have some American Catholics gotten so stupid? And so morally doltish? So morally doltish that they'd continue to put the reputations (and cash-flow needs) of venal rock-star priests or bishops and religious superiors ahead of the safety of children (or adults under pastoral care) who are endangered by predatory priests?

Until American Catholics deal with that question, too, I don't think we'll make much headway in addressing the abuse situation in any effective way?

2 years

2011-03-29T09:27:00.000-07:00

http://www.oregonlive.com/beaverton/index.ssf/2011/03/former_valley_catholic_high_school_tennis_coach_gets_nearly_two_years_in_prison_in_child_pornography.html
Former Valley Catholic High School tennis coach gets nearly two years in prison in child pornography case
Published: Monday, March 28, 2011, 3:43 PM Updated: Monday, March 28, 2011, 4:08 PM
By Rebecca Woolington, The Oregonian The Oregonian
WCSOChristopher Rijken
The case: A tennis coach at Valley Catholic High School on May 18 was arrested on charges that he took nude pictures of an underage girl.

Christopher Rijken, 27, of Beaverton, was arrested on charges of using a child in a display of sexually explicit conduct and encouraging child sexual abuse and was lodged in the Washington County Jail.

Rijken convinced a teenager to remove her clothes while the two were in the vicinity of the Portland Rose Garden near the Oregon Zoo, according to an affidavit filed in Washington County Circuit Court. The affidavit, filed by Beaverton police, says he told the girl to lift up her shirt.

When she questioned him, the affidavit says, he told her she had to do what he asked. She then removed her clothing, the affidavit says, and Rijken took pictures.

Rijken reportedly burned two CDs of the pictures and gave one of them to the girl. The affidavit says Rijken gave his laptop, iPhone and external hard drive to a friend.

According to the affidavit, he told police that the sexually suggestive photos were taken in the woods behind Catlin Gabel School.

Rijken's MySpace page said he worked as an assistant head coach at Valley Catholic and as a sales associate at Nike. His MySpace page also said he formerly worked as a receptionist and instructor at Tualatin Hills Tennis Center.

Update: A Washington County Grand Jury on May 25 indicted Rijken on four counts of using a child in a display of sexually explicit conduct and four counts of first-degree encouraging child sexual abuse, according to court records. Using a child in a display of sexually explicit conduct is a Measure 11 crime that carries a mandatory minimum prison sentence of five years and 10 months.

As part of a plea agreement, Rijken last week pleaded guilty to one count of attempted using a child in a display of sexually explicit conduct and two counts of first-degree encouraging child sexual abuse, said Washington County Deputy District Attorney Kevin Barton, who prosecuted the case. His other charges were dismissed.

Sentence: Rijken was sentenced to one year and eight months in prison, with three years post-prison supervision, Barton said. As part of his supervision, Rijken must undergo sex offender evaluations and treatment.

Rijken also may not use computers or cell phones with computer capabilities, Barton said, and is not allowed to have contact with the victim or minors. He may not frequent schools or work as a teacher, coach or in any other capacity with children under his supervision, Barton said.

Rijken will also be required to register as a sex offender for the rest of his life.

Afghan women

2011-03-29T06:16:00.000-07:00

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/mar/27/afghan-women-rights-afghanistan-peace
Afghan women are still at riskAnti-violence measures have been agreed but the safety and rights of women and girls are not protected on the ground

Share78 Comments (99)
Ivan Simonovic guardian.co.uk, Sunday 27 March 2011 14.00 BST Article history
Many abused Afghan women are afraid to seek help. Photograph: Jalil Rezayee/EPA

Sima is 15 but looks younger. I met her in Kabul, in the female juveniles section of the Badam Bagh prison. She talks very little, but her eyes are full of grief. A defence lawyer told me it was likely she had been raped.

What is Sima's crime? She is serving her sentence for running away from domestic violence. About half of all women in Afghan prisons are there for the same "crime". Some of them are in prison with their babies. The youngest ones are no older than 12. Having spent time in jail, they will rarely be accepted back by their families and communities.

Ten years since the Taliban fled Kabul, while new laws, policies and development aid have brought some benefits to Afghan women, deep-rooted challenges remain. The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights recently issued a report on harmful traditional practices against women and girls in Afghanistan. About half of women get married before the age of 15. It is estimated that 70-80% of marriages are forced. Selling girls or giving them away in settlement of a conflict is common practice. The literacy rate of Afghan girls of 15 or more is just 12%. Unsurprisingly, violence and abusive behaviour against them is widespread.

Afghanistan has ratified the convention on the elimination of discrimination against women, but its initial report is long overdue. A law on elimination of violence against women has been adopted recently, but its enforcement is a real challenge: victims are reluctant to seek help from police officers, 99% of whom are male.

So, what can they do when they face abuse? Desperate girls and women all too often commit suicide, an increasing number of them by self-immolation. Those who have the courage to run away and seek refuge within their family are often returned to their abusive husbands or parents. The ones who try to find a safe haven at their neighbours' or friends' houses face criminal charges for the intent to commit zina (adultery, or sexual relations out of marriage). The punishment is not provided by law – nor, I was told by experts, is it consistent with sharia, which requires witnesses and proof. It is based merely on an instruction of the supreme court of Afghanistan. The only safe haven for victims are NGO-run shelters for women and girls, yet Afghan authorities have recently threatened their continued operation.

I visited the oldest shelter in Afghanistan and talked to the girls and women under its protection. It was heartbreaking to hear their pleas for the maintenance of the shelters, as they are the only places they can go: "If this place is closed, I have no option then to kill myself", a young women told me. I raised the issue with President Karzai, who assured me that the number of shelters would not be reduced and that he was in favour of government financially supporting NGO-run shelters.

The UN security council has adopted a resolution extending the mandate of the UN assistance mission in Afghanistan. It "strongly condemns" continuing discrimination against women and girls; calls for enhanced efforts to secure their rights; and supports women's shelters. It also addresses the main problem: empowerment of Afghan women and ensuring that women's rights are an integral part of peace, reintegration and reconciliation efforts. If girls are not educated and women not included in political life, public administration and the justice system, traditional harmful practices will continue and their human rights will never be protected. Only if they are present and active in peace talks can they rest assured that even the modest gains secured to date will not be used as bargaining chips.

For peace to be sustainable and just, both Taliban and women should sit at the negotiating table and be included in shaping decisions on the future of Afghanistan.

Another charge

2011-03-29T05:35:00.000-07:00

http://www.coventrytelegraph.net/news/coventry-news/2011/03/29/man-claims-to-be-victim-of-jailed-coventry-pervert-priest-92746-28421530/

Man claims to be victim of jailed Coventry pervert priest

Mar 29 2011
0ShareANOTHER man has come forward to claim he was a victim of former Coventry priest James Robinson.

The 73-year-old was jailed for 21 years at Birmingham Crown Court last October after being found guilty of multiple sex offences against six boys, as young as 10.

His trial followed a lengthy extradition process after he fled to America amid abuse rumours in the 1980s.

The Telegraph previously reported how two new victims came forward before Robinson’s trial but action could not be taken in relation to their claims.

Anna Wheeler, a senior prosecutor with West Midlands Crown Prosecution Service’s Complex Casework Unit, extradited Robinson to face justice.

Ms Wheeler revealed two new victims had come forward before the trial and another afterwards.

She explained there will be no further prosecution, although their evidence is “entirely believable”.

She said: “One of two new victims who came forward just before the trial had previously sued the Church over his abuse. He didn’t wish to be involved in the court case.

‘‘The other person was unable mentally to cope with the idea of court proceedings.’’

Ms Wheeler added that one other person had come forward to claim they had been abused by Robinson after he was jailed.

Read More http://www.coventrytelegraph.net/news/coventry-news/2011/03/29/man-claims-to-be-victim-of-jailed-coventry-pervert-priest-92746-28421530/#ixzz1HzWqQkhz

Priest accused

2011-03-29T05:27:00.000-07:00

http://www.620wtmj.com/news/local/118828859.html
Man To Detail Alleged Abuse by Priest
Story Created: Mar 29, 2011

(Story Updated: Mar 29, 2011 )

WEST ALLIS - A man from West Allis was expected to come forward on Tuesday and detail his claims of being abused while a student at St. Nicholas Parish in Milwaukee.

The man alleges that Fr. Laurin Wenig sexually abused him as a child.

Because of the allegations, Fr. Wenig was removed from active ministry at St. Mary's in Elm Grove.

Fr. Wenig denies the man's claims.

Polish pedopriest

2011-03-29T05:17:00.000-07:00

http://www.thenews.pl/national/artykul152225_priest-in-paedophilia-trial.html
Priest in paedophilia trial

29.03.2011 12:37

A former pastor from the coastal resort town of Kolobrzeg is in court today accused of two counts of unlawful sexual acts with minors.

Owing to requests from both the plaintiffs and the defendant, the case will remain closed to journalists.

The priest stands charged with performing a sexual act on a 14-year-old boy in 1999, and an 11-year-old boy in the years 2000-2001.

The accused is pleading not guilty to the charges.

The pastor served in Kolobrzeg between 1998 and 2008. However, he was dismissed from his post by the Church for allegedly breaking his vows of celibacy with an adult man.

If found guilty, the priest could face ten years in prison. (mg)

Statute of limitations

2011-03-29T05:09:00.000-07:00

http://www.kimatv.com/news/local/118814499.html
Statute of Limitations Hinders Sexual Abuse Cases
Tools0 CommentsEmail this articleFacebookDiggPrint this article By Ryan Simms Story Published: Mar 28, 2011 at 6:21 PM PDT
YAKIMA -- KIMA is following up on the massive sexual abuse settlement involving the Jesuit society.

Multimedia Watch The Video Many of you wondered why father John Morse, accused of molesting 38 people, hasn't faced any charges.

We learned the statute of limitations expired on all the cases against him.

Lawyers say it's a problem that happens all too often in sexual abuse cases.

KIMA learned there is a bill in Olympia that would do away with the statute of limitations for sexual abuse cases.

It's currently being heard in a house committee.

Prosecute

2011-03-29T04:59:00.000-07:00

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/editorials/2014623240_edit29church.html
Prosecute the Catholic sex-abuse scandals
Promised reforms in the wake of the Roman Catholic Church's sex-abuse scandals should not insulate priests and bishops from legal accountability. Prosecute those accused of sex offensives and send the guilty to jail. Church leaders have repeatedly demonstrated their loyalty is to their vocation, not church members.

Related

AFTER decades of silence, deceit and settlements, the Roman Catholic Church's sexual-abuse scandal might finally be headed where it truly belongs, U.S. criminal courts.

Church leadership has been granted extraordinary latitude in handling epic cases of sexual assault against children who put their innocence and trust in religious figures who violated them, sometimes for years. Again and again, bishops invested more loyalty in the clergy responsible for the assaults than in the people in the pews.

Last week, a $166 million settlement was announced for victims abused by Jesuit priests on Northwest tribal lands and in remote Alaskan villages. Affirmation of their suffering and belated accountability for their exploiters will mean as much as the eventual financial payouts.

But real progress came across the country in Philadelphia, where a judge approved requests by the district attorney to move ahead in a case involving accusations of rape and conspiracy involving clergy, and a subsequent cover-up by a senior church official.

In a related development, The New York Times reports a grand jury in Philadelphia found as many as 37 priests accused of sexual abuse or inappropriate behavior were allowed to continue serving in the priesthood. The church's local review boards were in the dark about the failures to adhere to decade-old guidelines that came out of a horrific scandal in Boston.

In the U.S. and elsewhere, the church was given authority and deference it did not deserve and repeatedly violated in the handling of cases that date back decades. Instances of abuse are still being revealed. Unconscionable acts with injurious results have been met with the most hypocritical behavior.

The church's response has amounted to an international cover-up for heinous acts from California to Connecticut, as well as Australia, Poland, Spain, Switzerland, Ireland and Germany.

Worldwide the pattern has been to hide the truth, mount counterattacks about Catholic bashing and stall.

The outside world did not sully a sacred vocation. No more operating above the law. Turn those accused of assault and abuse over to secular authorities. Send the guilty to jail.

Settlement

2011-03-29T04:46:00.000-07:00

http://www.courant.com/news/connecticut/hc-clergy-sex-abuse-0329-20110328,0,4825450.story
Settlement In Priest Abuse Case Revealed
Alleged victim serving time for murder

David Clohessy of SNAPnetwork.org, a survivors network for people abused by priests, wipes his eyes outside of St. Joseph's Cathedral during a moment of silence for victims of abuse. Clohessy met with members of the press outside the church today to urge Catholic Archbishops to disclose names of dangerous clerics. (MARK MIRKO / HARTFORD COURANT / March 28, 2011)

Hartford, CT, USA
By DAVE ALTIMARI, daltimar@courant.com

The Hartford Courant

6:00 p.m. EDT, March 28, 2011
E-mail Print Share Text Size hc-clergy-sex-abuse-0329-20110328
A convicted murderer serving a 60-year sentence in Maine for killing his grandfather received a secret settlement from the Hartford Archdiocese after charging that a Bristol priest sexually abused him when he was a teenager, an advocacy group revealed Monday.

Although the undisclosed settlement was paid to Jeffrey Libby in 2009, the leaders of a priest abuse survivors' group held a press conference Monday in front of the archdiocese's Farmington Avenue headquarters to call on Bishop Henry J. Mansell to acknowledge the settlement. They also urged the Catholic Church to disclose what happened to the priest who allegedly abused Libby in the early 1980's.

The priest served as parish priest in Bristol and Plainville. Maria Zone, a spokeswoman for the archdiocese, said Monday that the priest was placed on administrative leave in 2005, which means he cannot function as a priest.

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[Sample Our Free Breaking News Alert And 3 P.M. News Newsletters]
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Zone would not comment on why he was placed on leave or his current whereabouts. She said the diocese is still paying him a stipend. Zone said the diocese's policy is not to comment on specific settlements.

"It is important that the public know that the Archdiocese of Hartford is doing everything possible to keep our youth safe,'' Zone said. "Child sexual abuse is a despicable crime, which will not be tolerated."

Zone said that all parish employees and volunteers over the age of 18 who have regular contact with children must complete a curriculum called the, "Safe Environment Program" which includes background checks as well as a training session on sexual abuse awareness.

Survivor's Network of Priest Abuse (SNAP) National President David Clohessy acknowledged that Libby's case is rather unusual because he is a convicted killer, but said he had no doubt that his allegations are true.

"In my 23 years that I have been doing this work this is one of the worst cases. Jeff was abused in the most horrific ways over 200 times,'' Clohessy said. "Why would the diocese pay a substantial settlement to settle a lawsuit that was not even filed yet with a convicted murderer unless they were convinced that he was telling the truth?''

Clohessy, who said the settlement amount is confidential although he categorized it as "far more than $20,000," spoke to Libby a few weeks ago. The group decided to publicize his case because of concerns about the priest's whereabouts.

Although the settlement was made quietly, Libby has been using it in his efforts to get out of prison early. He is serving a 60-year sentence for drowning his grandfather in 1986.

Under Maine law, Libby would not be eligible for clemency until he has served 30 years of his sentence. He has filed a petition asking that his sentence be commuted now based primarily on the abuse, which he didn't tell anybody about at the time of his sentencing.

His petition was denied, according to Richard Olsen, his attorney in Maine.

"They specifically told Jeff that there had never been any other allegations made against this priest and he was the only one, which was one reason he agreed to the settlement,'' Olsen said.

SNAP held press conferences at other sites Monday, including one in Rhode Island where it called on the state's Roman Catholic leader to release the names of all priests who have worked in Rhode Island and have been accused of sex abuse.

SNAP and BishopAccountability.org also urged Bishop Thomas Tobin to seek out victims of John Dority, a priest convicted of child molestation in Rhode Island in 2005. Dority was released from prison in 2007 and now lives in Coventry, according to the Connecticut State Police sex offender registry.

Elder abuse

2011-03-29T04:32:00.001-07:00

http://www.wral.com/news/local/story/9341683/
Police: Dunn pastor assaulted assisted living center patient
Paul Burke JohnsonRELATEDAllegations against Dunn pastor came from assisted living center
Sexual misconduct charge rocks Harnett County church
Dunn pastor charged with sexual battery
NC Wanted: Read more crime news or report a tip
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Benson, N.C. — The sexual misconduct charges against a Harnett County pastor involved a patient at an assisted living center in Benson, police said Monday.

Paul Burke Johnson, 74, the pastor of Calvary Baptist Church in Dunn, was charged Thursday with four counts of misdemeanor sexual battery.

Benson Police Chief Kenneth Edwards said Johnson had visited patients at Liberty Commons Nursing Center, at 2315 N.C. Highway 242 North, for the past year and had several encounters with a 64-year-old woman there. The woman has a diminished mental capacity, Edwards said.

According to a statement released by police, Johnson had "repeated inappropriate sexual contact" with the woman and has "fully admitted his involvement in the incidents," which took place over the past four or five months.

A nurse at the facility witnessed an encounter between Johnson and the woman on Thursday and reported it to supervisors, who called police.

"At Liberty Commons, we take all allegations of potential abuse very seriously," administrator Jackie Livermore said in a statement.

The alleged encounters didn't involve intercourse or any contact that would constitute a felony, Edwards said, so Johnson was charged with misdemeanors.

Johnson, who was released after posting a $20,000 bond, did not show up at church Sunday.

"Right now everybody is just confused, upset. Everybody is in tears," church member James Norris said. "It's a tough time for everybody."

Johnson is also on the Board of Ministers for the Campbell University Divinity School. University President Jerry Wallace said Sunday that he had heard of the allegations but wasn't prepared to comment on them.

Johnson is scheduled to appear in court May 6.

Jesuits sued

2011-03-29T04:23:00.000-07:00

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/29/us/29jesuit.html?_r=2&pagewanted=all

Suit Says Jesuits Ignored Warnings About PriestBy ERIK ECKHOLM
Published: March 28, 2011
Jesuit leaders in Chicago largely ignored or kept secret numerous reports, spanning four decades, that a prominent priest was sexually abusing teenage boys, lawyers fovictims charged on Monday in a motion for punitive damages in a Chicago court.

Enlarge This Image

Donald J. McGuire, later convicted of sexual abuse, above with John Doe 129 at his First Communion in 1985, in a photograph provided by John Doe 129.
Related
Catholic Order Reaches $166 Million Settlement With Sexual Abuse Victims (March 26, 2011)
Priests and Judge in Abuse Case Spar Over Legal Fees (March 15, 2011)
Enlarge This Image

Donald J. McGuire with Mother Teresa in 1991 in a photograph provided by John Doe 129.
Included in the motion were more than 65 recently obtained church documents and depositions that, the lawyers said, demonstrated “a reckless disregard for the safety of others in the face of repeated reports of sexual misconduct” on the part of Chicago Jesuit leaders.

The former priest, Donald J. McGuire, now 80, was convicted on several counts of sex abuse in state and federal courts in 2006 and 2008, and is serving a 25-year federal sentence.

The newly public documents date from the early 1960s, when a concerned Austrian priest, in imperfect English, first observed in a letter to Chicago Jesuits that Father McGuire, newly ordained and studying in Europe, had “much relations with several boys.” The reports extend into the last decade, when Father McGuire reportedly ignored admonitions to stop traveling with young assistants, molesting one as late as 2003, as law enforcement was closing in. The legal motion argues that Father McGuire’s superiors in Chicago turned “a blind eye to his criminal actions.”

The current case started with a civil suit brought by six men who say they were victims. Three have since settled with the Jesuits, but three others, identified as John Doe 117, John Doe 118 and John Doe 129, are still pursuing the suit against the Chicago Province of the Society of Jesus and Mr. McGuire. Most of the newly released documents were obtained in the discovery process for the suit: letters and memos the church was required to produce from its files, and transcripts of depositions.

The motion filed on Monday asks the Cook County Circuit Court to take the unusual step of considering additional, punitive damages, given what the motion says is the evidence of a long trail of credible warnings about the priest’s behavior and ineffective responses by church officials.

Terence McKiernan, president of BishopAccountability.org, a victim advocacy group that has long monitored the church’s response to sexual abuse charges, said that the series of warnings given to Jesuit leaders by parents and fellow priests was unusually long and clear.

“I have never seen such detailed and frequent notice received by the priest’s superiors, so many ‘directives’ regarding the priest’s future behavior, and so much evidence presented to his superiors that those directives were being violated, without the priest being removed from ministry,” Mr. McKiernan said.

His group has posted a history of the case and many of the key documents.

Mariah E. Moran, a lawyer for the Chicago Province, said she could not comment on the motion because she had not had a chance to study it, and a spokesman for the province did not respond to requests for comment. In depositions and settlement meetings over the last three years, senior Jesuit officials have said that until recent years they had not heard firm-enough evidence of sexual abuse to justify stronger action against Father McGuire.

Last week, the Jesuits’ Oregon Province agreed to pay $166 million to hundreds of victims of sexual abuse, which occurred decades ago at remote Indian boarding schools. The two cases shed rare light on how religious orders have dealt with charges of sexual abuse, as opposed to the Catholic dioceses and bishops at the center of most recent scandals. The Jesuits are the world’s largest Roman Catholic religious order.

The motion filed on Monday charges that the church misled prosecutors in 2006, with its lawyers claiming that they had little information about the priest — despite the lengthy record of complaints.

The case has been acutely troublesome for the Jesuits, an order known for its scholarship and its elite high schools and universities. Father McGuire was by all accounts a mesmerizing teacher, and after he was barred by some Jesuit schools in the 1960s and 1970s for suspicious behavior, including having students share his bedroom, he went on to became a popular leader of eight-day spiritual retreats around the country and the world.

For about two decades, starting in the early 1980s, he was a spiritual adviser to Mother Teresa, who put him in charge of retreats for the nuns in her worldwide order, Missionaries of Charity. Several times each year, in India, the United States, Russia and other countries, he led retreats for the sisters.

In these travels he routinely took along a teenage boy as an assistant, saying he needed help administering his diabetes treatment. In complaints voiced by some parents and priests at the time, and in later depositions, those assistants said their duties often included sleeping in the same bed as Father McGuire, showering and reading pornography together, providing intimate massages and watching him masturbate.

The Jesuits have their own administrative structure, with a leader in Rome and regional provinces in the United States, although they also operate with permission from local bishops.

On his return from Europe in the 1960s, Father McGuire was assigned to live and teach at Loyola Academy, a high school in Wilmette, Ill. Two boys stayed with him in his room for about two years each, where he constantly abused them, according to the 2006 trial.

In 1969 the second of those boys, then 15, ran away and described the abuse to his parish priest, who contacted the Jesuit president of the academy. The school responded by removing Father McGuire, but, according to a letter released on Monday, publicly described his departure as a “sabbatical.”

In 1991, in another of the many warnings revealed on Monday, the director of a retreat house in California reported to the Chicago Province’s leader that Father McGuire was traveling with a teenage boy from Alaska and sharing a bed with him, and that the boy’s mother had expressed her concern that “her son has in some way changed.”

That year, the Chicago Province’s leader, the Rev. Robert A. Wild, imposed the first set of “guidelines” on Father McGuire. In written instructions he said: “I ask that you not travel on any overnight trip with any boy or girl under the age of 18 and preferably even under the age of 21.” But Father McGuire was left to police himself, and Father Wild said in a 2009 deposition that he had regarded the case as “a serious matter” but also “ambiguous.”

The province sent Father McGuire in 1993 for a psychiatric examination and six months at a treatment center in Maryland — but in the week before he was to report for the evaluation, he was allowed to conduct a retreat in Phoenix, where he molested another boy, the documents indicate.

As late as 1998, the new documents show, the Chicago provincial wrote a letter of “good standing” for Father McGuire to allow him to minister in a diocese, stating that “there is nothing to our knowledge in his background which would restrict any ministry with minors.”

As the reports of abuse accumulated, the Chicago leaders issued one set of restrictions after another on Father McGuire, finally, in 2002, saying he could minister only to nuns in the Chicago region. But none of these directives were enforced, the court motion asserts.

Father McGuire was formally removed from the priesthood in February 2008 after a conviction in Wisconsin and after a federal indictment had been issued in Illinois.

Time extension

2011-03-29T03:57:00.000-07:00

http://www.wset.com/Global/story.asp?S=14335734
McDonnell signs sex abuse lawsuit extension bill

Associated Press - March 28, 2011 3:35 PM ET

RICHMOND, Va. (AP) - Victims of sexual abuse now have 10 times longer to file a lawsuit in Virginia.

Gov. Bob McDonnell signed legislation Saturday extending the deadline to file a civil lawsuit against an attacker or an organization responsible for the assault from two years to 20 years.

The Catholic Church, which faced a priest sex scandal that triggered lawsuits nationwide, lobbied hard against the extension. Advocates had worried McDonnell, a Catholic, would change the bill.

There is no time limit to file criminal charges against an attacker.

In emotional testimony, victims of child sexual abuse persuaded lawmakers that two years often wasn't enough time to file civil lawsuits. The time begins either when the victim turns 18 or, in the case of repressed memories, when he or she recalls the abuse.

Whistleblowers

2011-03-29T03:47:00.000-07:00

http://www.whistleblowersblog.org/2011/03/articles/corporate-1/supreme-court-considers-whistleblower-protection-for-ministerial-employees/
ome > Corporate Whistleblowers > Supreme Court considers whistleblower protection for "ministerial employees"
Supreme Court considers whistleblower protection for "ministerial employees"
Posted on March 28, 2011 by Richard Renner
The U.S. Supreme Court is considering whether to review a Michigan decision that allows a church to fire a middle school math teacher after she reported suspected sexual abuse to government authorities. According to the Court's docket, this case has been distributed for consideration at all three Friday conferences this month. The Court's web page says that decisions are normally released on the Monday following each Friday conference. One might therefore conclude that this case is not normal. The case is Weishuhn v. Catholic Diocese of Lansing, Case No. 10-760. Adding to the intrigue, today the Supreme Court accepted another case in which it will consider the scope of the "ministerial exception" to employment lawsuits (Hosanna-Tabor Church v. EEOC, Case No. 10-553). In the Hosanna-Tabor Church case, the Supreme Court will be reviewing a decision by the Sixth Circuit that reinstated the disability and retaliation claims of Cheryl Perich. Perich was a third and fourth grade teacher at the Church's school in Michigan. She took a disability leave for the 2004-2005 school year due to a recent onset of narcolepsy. Before the year was up, and after Perich retained an attorney to represent her in saving her job, the Church fired her. The Sixth Circuit held that, "Perich’s claim would not require the court to analyze any church doctrine; rather a trial would focus on issues such as whether Perich was disabled within the meaning of the ADA, whether Perich opposed a practice that was unlawful under the ADA, and whether Hosanna-Tabor violated the ADA in its treatment of Perich."

So surely if teachers in religious schools can be protected when they hire a lawyer to assert disability claims, they should also be protected when they report suspected sexual abuse to government authorities. No so in Michigan state courts. In Weishuhn v. Catholic Diocese of Lansing, the state court of appeals held that, "Termination of a ministerial employee by a religious institution is an absolutely protected action under the First Amendment, regardless of the reason for doing so." Because Madeline Weishuhn told The Catholic times that, "My ultimate goal is to help each student develop into a young Christian person who has a conscience." her duties were primarily religious, "notwithstanding the fact that she taught four mathematics and two religion classes in her last year of teaching." Weishuhn's petition to the Supreme Court explains, in a footnote on page 16 (page 26 of this PDF file), that:

[S]he was retaliated against for making complaints of sex discrimination in the workplace. Plaintiff also asserted a claim under the Michigan Whistleblowers’ Protection Act after being terminated for reporting suspected sexual abuse of a student to the appropriate governmental authority

The Michigan court of appeals never used the words "sexual abuse" in considering the state's interest in protecting children. On page 8, the court did say, "We recognize that it seems unjust that employees of religious institutions can be fired without recourse for reporting illegal activities, particularly given that members of the clergy, as well as teachers, are mandated reporters." Perhaps soon the U.S. Supreme Court will see the wisdom in granting Madeline Weishuhn's petition so that all teachers will be protected when they report suspected child abuse.

Name accused

2011-03-29T03:38:00.000-07:00

http://www.mysanantonio.com/news/article/Groups-RI-diocese-should-name-accused-priests-1310552.php
Groups: RI diocese should name accused priests
IAN MacDOUGALL, Associated Press
Updated 02:00 p.m., Monday, March 28, 2011
PROVIDENCE, R.I. (AP) — The state's Roman Catholic leader should release the names of all priests who have worked in Rhode Island and have been accused of sex abuse, two groups that advocate for victims of clergy sex abuse said Monday.

"It's a moral and civic duty of the Providence bishop to disclose those names, their whereabouts and the accusations against them," said David Clohessy, national director of The Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests.

His group and BishopAccountability.org also urged Bishop Thomas Tobin to seek out victims of John Dority, a priest convicted of child molestation in Rhode Island in 2005. Dority was released from prison in 2007 and now lives in Coventry, Conn., according to the Connecticut state police's sex offender registry.

The groups say they recently learned Dority, 69, was a Franciscan priest in other states, and they want Tobin to say whether he ever worked as a priest in Rhode Island.

The Providence Diocese says it has no record of Dority working as a priest in Rhode Island. He left the Franciscans in 1976 and was formally defrocked in 1980, according to Jocelyn Thomas, a spokesman for the order, officially called the Order of Friars Minor.

Dority is the subject of a lawsuit brought in Massachusetts by two unnamed plaintiffs who claim they were sexually assaulted by the former priest for several years in the 1960s and 1970s, starting when they were 10 and 13.

He has not answered the lawsuit because he cannot afford an attorney and because he admits to its allegations, he told The Associated Press.

"What I did was completely wrong. I admit that. I'm very sorry for the trouble I caused, the harm I caused," Dority said in a phone interview. He said he voluntarily underwent 1 1/2 years of therapy for sex offenders while in prison in Rhode Island and has not committed any abuse since his release.

Catholic officials in Rhode Island have said the diocese is aggressive in its efforts to find victims of clergy abuse.

Anne Barrett Doyle, of BishopAccountability.org, says the diocese has admitted that it knows of 125 priests facing accusations of child abuse since 1971, but has only made some of those priests' names public.

"That makes this diocese one of the most dangerous dioceses in the nation for children," Doyle said. She said there have been about 1,200 active priests in the diocese since 1950, meaning that over 10 percent of them have been accused of child abuse.

Clohessy also called on Rhode Island Attorney General Peter F. Kilmartin to launch a grand jury investigation into accusations of sex crimes committed by Catholic clergymen in the state. The group is planning to send a letter to Kilmartin.

Amy Kempe, a spokesman for the attorney general's office, declined to comment because the office has not received a request from the groups yet.

In Philadelphia, a recent two-year grand jury investigation resulted in charges against two priests, a former priest and a Catholic school teacher who are accused of raping boys. It also led to child endangerment charges against a former high-ranking Philadelphia Archdiocese official who was accused of transferring problem priests to new parishes without warning anyone of prior sex abuse complaints.

Read more: http://www.mysanantonio.com/news/article/Groups-RI-diocese-should-name-accused-priests-1310552.php#ixzz1Hz2m1QTk

Sexual torture

2011-03-29T03:22:00.000-07:00

http://www.gadsdentimes.com/article/20110328/APN/1103281387
Ala pastor charged with sexual torture resigns
The Associated Press Published: Monday, March 28, 2011 at 9:46 a.m.
Last Modified: Monday, March 28, 2011 at 9:46 a.m.
Police say a former Montgomery minister has been arrested and charged with sexual torture and aggravated child abuse.

The minister, 47-year-old Barry Cook, was arrested Thursday. Cook resigned Monday from his position at the Christian Life Church of Montgomery, citing personal issues.

Cook is being held in the Montgomery County Detention Facility on a $500,000 bond. Police say the former minister will be arrested on an outstanding domestic violence warrant when he is released from the county jail.

Child Protect is a Montgomery organization that assists law enforcement in child abuse cases. Director Jannah Bailey says she is shocked the accusations were made against a minister.

More charges

2011-03-29T03:15:00.000-07:00

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/north/story/2011/03/28/nunavut-dejaeger-charges.html
Priest faces more sex charges in Nunavut
CBC News Posted: Mar 28, 2011 9:47 AM CT Last Updated: Mar 28, 2011 9:47 AM CT Back to accessibility links
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Priest faces new Nunavut sex charge
End of Supporting Story ContentBack to accessibility links Beginning of Story ContentMore charges have been laid against Eric Dejaeger, a Roman Catholic priest accused of sex crimes against children in Nunavut in the late-1970s and 1980s.

Eric Dejaeger, right, is escorted by an RCMP officer out of the Iqaluit courthouse on Jan. 20, shortly after he was brought back to Canada from Belgium. (CBC)
Three more individuals from Igloolik, Nunavut, came forward in the past month with new accusations against Dejaeger, who had served as a missionary in the eastern Arctic community between 1978 and 1982, according to court documents obtained by CBC News.

Dejaeger, now 63, faces a total of 20 criminal charges, which include indecent assault and buggery, from multiple complainants. He initially faced six charges when he was brought back to Nunavut in January.

A male complainant accuses Dejaeger of using violence to force him not to report any suspicious activity, according to court documents.

Dejaeger fled to Belgium, his country of birth, after he served a jail term in Canada for sex crimes against children in Baker Lake, another Nunavut community. He left Canada around the time that the Igloolik charges were first filed in 1995.

Dejaeger lived freely in Belgium for almost 16 years until January, when Belgian immigration officials declared that he had overstayed his legal residency in that country.

According to government officials there, the priest gave up his Belgian citizenship when he became a Canadian citizen in 1977.

Since he was brought back to Canada, Dejaeger has been kept in custody at the Baffin Correctional Centre in Iqaluit. He is due back in court on April 5.

Abuse hearing

2011-03-29T03:05:00.000-07:00

http://www.courthousenews.com/2011/03/25/35265.htm
atholic Sex-Abuse Hearing Descends Into `Shut Up' Order and Charge of 'Abomination'
By REUBEN KRAMER
ShareThis

PHILADELPHIA (CN) - At an intensely combative and vitriolic hearing Friday afternoon in a sex-abuse case that has shaken the Philadelphia Archdiocese to its core, the judge left one defense attorney seething after disclosing that he could be disqualified from the case because the government thinks the lawyer might be a witness as a former seminarian.
The lawyer, who represents a current Roman Catholic priest charged with raping a boy in his parish, fired back that prosecutors were being "anti-Catholic" and had uttered an "abomination."
Court of Common Pleas Judge Renee Cardwell Hughes told defense attorney Richard DeSipio that she's received information that "might make you, in fact, a witness because of events that occurred while you were a seminarian."
The information "stems from the fact that you attended the seminary with a student who asserts he was abused," Hughes said, adding that DeSipio "may possess factual knowledge about abuse that occurred with that student."
She added that the substance of the claim that DiSipio witnessed something is still unclear. "I just don't know if it's true," Hughes said. "I really don't know if it's true."
Yelling and visibly upset, DeSipio demanded that the government, then and there, identify the source of the allegation. "Let them spill it out right now!" DeSipio demanded.
"How dare they send you a letter about that," DeSipio said, referring to the district attorney's office. "That's an abomination."
Monsignor William Lynn, who is accused of giving sex abusers easy access to minors, was the dean of students at a seminary while DeSipio attended the school, a prosecutor said. The charges against Lynn stem from his tenure as clergy secretary for the Philadelphia Archdiocese where he acted as personnel director for priests. He is reportedly the highest-ranking member of the Roman Catholic Church in the United States ever to be charged with child endangerment. Unlike his four co-defendants, including two current and one former priest, Lynn is not charged with rape or sexual assault.
"They are anti-Catholic. I'll say it," DiSipio fumed. "[The district attorney is] attacking me as a Catholic!"
The judge rejected DiSipio's claim. "Attack you? You attacked me! You don't even know me!" Hughes said, referring to a prior argument over the necessity of a preliminary hearing, another hotly contested issue Friday afternoon.
"Mr. DeSipio, I suggest you shut up," Hughes said. "People are coming from out of the woodwork [to provide information to the commonwealth.]"
If the government can prove the allegation is credible in 30 days, DeSipio will be disqualified as an attorney for one of the priests charged with rape, the Rev. James Brennan.
"You can change lawyers now, you can change lawyers in 30," the judge warned DeSipio's client. "[But] there are some conflicts that are not waivable."
DeSipio argued that the 30-day investigation was "really unfair to Father Brennan," given his mounting legal costs.
Judge Hughes was livid that DeSipio spoke up again. "If you open your mouth one more time I am going to have the sheriff take you out of here," she told DeSipio.
As DeSipio continued to argue, Hughes said she might have him "locked up and held in contempt." Instead she issued a gag order, responding to what she observed as attorneys having "gone to the airways to advocate."
"No more interviews with anyone," the judge ruled.
"Does that include the DA going on Chris Matthews' 'Hardball' and going to the New York Times," defense attorney Michael McGovern asked.
The judge responded affirmatively: "I don't want tweets. I don't want Facebook. I don't want IMs [instant messages]."
Hughes said the court will revisit the gag order on April 15, when the defendants are to be arraigned. That date also marks the deadline for the DA to provide the defense with the first batch of discovery, she said.
The Rev. Brennan is accused in a grand jury report released in February of raping a 14-year-old boy while Brennan was serving as a parochial vicar of St. Andrew Church in Newtown, a Philadelphia suburb, in 1996. According to the report, Brennan arranged to have the boy, whom he had known for five years, sleep over his apartment. During the sleepover, "he lay down behind the boy and put his penis into the boy's buttocks," according to the report.
DeSipio said his client deserves a preliminary hearing, which could allow Brennan to confront his accuser.
"This accuser says there was an erect penis in his buttocks," DeSipio said. "Was it in your buttocks, or was it in your anus," he asked rhetorically, referring to a distinction that could have significant legal implications. "If that question wasn't asked [of the grand jury], and he didn't specify anus or butt cheeks, I have a right to ask that."
The lawyer also called the credibility of Brennan's accuser into question by referencing reports that he is in jail on a drug charge and has a criminal record that includes a conviction for lying to law enforcement officials.
"There's no witness," DeSipio said. "I know that they [the prosecutors] don't like that he's in jail."
According to the grand jury report, Brennan's alleged victim became reclusive and started abusing heroin after the sleepover at Brennan's apartment. The report states that the second accuser, who was allegedly victimized by three different defendants, attempted suicide after battling with depression and a drug and alcohol addiction after he was abused.
This child was allegedly abused beginning in 1999 while he was a 10-year-old altar boy in the fifth grade at the St. Jerome School in Philadelphia. The Rev. Charles Engelhardt is accused of having oral sex with the boy, who was then "in effect passed around to Engelhardt's colleagues," according to the report. "Father Edward Avery undressed with the boy, told him that God loved him, had him engage in oral intercourse, and ejaculated on him," the report continues. "Next was the turn of Bernard Shero, a teacher in the school. Shero offered Billy a ride home, but instead stopped at a park, told Billy they were 'going to have some fun,' took off the boy's clothes, orally and anally raped him, and then made him walk the rest of the way home."
Avery has since been defrocked. "For what they did, Father Avery, Father Engelhardt, Father Brennan, and teacher Shero will all be charged with rape and related offenses," the report states.
All but one of the men's defense attorneys challenged the government's attempt to amend its case by adding a conspiracy charge that had not explicitly been requested of the grand jury.
"The issue here is that if the DA seeks to amend, it has to be subject to some sort of prima facie determination," the defense argued.
The judge found otherwise, ruling that the commonwealth established "good cause" in its pleadings and that "there is no constitutional right - federal or state - for a preliminary hearing."
It was "a technical error on the commonwealth not to charge conspiracy" originally, Hughes said. "Conspiracy is made," and the defendants will not be afforded a preliminary hearing, she ruled.
Hughes said there was abundant evidence to support the amendment.
"I'm the only person, besides the prosecutors, who has seen every stitch of evidence," she said.
Defense attorney McGovern, who represents Engelhardt, said this nondisclosure was precisely the problem.
"Your Honor, this is patently unfair!" McGovern said. "You know the evidence. They know the evidence. I don't know what the evidence is! I haven't seen any!"
The attorney said proceeding to trial without a preliminary hearing was like saying, "Let's have a dart game in a dark room."
"What kind of country is this where we have this?" McGovern shouted.
The judge barked back, baring her teeth: "You sit down! Sit, sit, sit!"
DeSipio joined in McGovern's call for a preliminary hearing. "What you can't do, and what I submit they're trying to do, is say just because we have a grand jury, we have good cause [to bypass a preliminary hearing]," DeSipio said.
The judge also addressed a potential conflict of interest concerning Monsignor Lynn. Plans for the Archdiocese of Philadelphia to pay Lynn's legal costs present "a whole array of conflicts that I can't even imagine at this point in time," Hughes said.
"It's real simple," the judge said to Lynn, who was donning his clerical collar, "your master is the person that's putting bread on the table."
"It may be in your best interest to put forth a defense that attacks other people [or the church]," Hughes said.
She told Lynn he was putting himself in the position of receiving "advice from people who are being paid by people whose interests don't necessarily align with yours."
The stakes of this gamble could amount to "14 years of incarceration versus probation," she said.
Lynn, in a calm voice, declined. "Well, I trust these two men," he said, adding that the church hadn't placed any conditions on the payment of his legal costs.
Hughes was incredulous. "You are making a knowing, voluntary and intelligent decision to place yourself in conflict with your attorneys?" she asked.
"I am," Lynn responded, waiving his right to any future appeal based on the argument that his attorneys had a conflict of interest.
"Then we're moving forward," the judge said.
After arraignments and release of the first batch of discovery, which will include grand jury notes and testimony, on April 15, the government will prepare the release of a second batch. The government said that batch would take longer to produce, as it will include roughly 10,000 pages of documentation, much of which will need to be redacted.
Hughes said the government must give the defense a specific timeline for the production of the second batch. "There has to be some finality," she said.
Publication of the grand jury's report on Feb. 11 triggered the administrative leave of 24 priests over the next month in the Philadelphia Archdiocese.

Statute of limitations

2011-03-29T02:57:00.000-07:00

http://www.diamondbackonline.com/opinion/staff-editorial-justice-for-all-1.2125807
The Diamondback > Opinion

Staff editorial: Justice for all
By Diamondback editorial board

Published: Monday, March 28, 2011

Updated: Sunday, March 27, 2011 21:03

Related Articles
Univ. officials back longer statute of limitations
There are few things more devastating or damaging than sexual assault. Depending on the degree and length of abuse, a person can be scarred in varying degrees. For minors, the repercussions can be even more severe. And yet, in this state, those who are victims of groping or fondling, usually classified as fourth-degree assault, have no more than one year to report the crime. A day longer and the statute of limitations expires, and the person who committed the crime cannot be charged.

However, that may soon change.

Legislation before the General Assembly would rewrite that law to extend the statute of limitations to three years in order to provide a larger window for victims to come to terms with the crime committed against them and seek help.

And while the original piece of legislation applied to all victims, regardless of age, legislators have since amended the bill, extending that three year window for only those who were under the age of 18 when the crime occurred. To be sure, there are substantial arguments in favor of extending the statute of limitations for minors — who are often scared into silence by their abusers or cannot process the magnitude of the incident — but there are equally valid reasons to extend this protection to adults.

Adults may also take longer than the one year allotted by the state to come to terms with abuse. Additionally, the definition of adults also applies to students at this university. An 18-year-old freshman in college has just 12 months to report any instance of sexual assault that does not involve penetration. With most college sexual offenses occurring after heavy drinking, it can sometimes take time for students to realize the gravity of what occurred. An environment of alcohol consumption and promiscuity can also mask the true nature of what happened.

Moreover, adults who are mentally disabled are often easy targets for sexual abuse. The degree to which they are disabled can cause them to experience the same kind of confusion and fear a child might feel, and yet they too have just one year to report the crime.

University officials have put their support behind the bill, despite the fact that, as written, it excludes most college students. Although students assaulted when they are 17 or younger would still benefit from an amended bill, the university should use its voice to insist legislators expand the statute of limitations to all victims, not just minors.

Some may argue that extending the statute of limitations to all victims would become a nightmare for an investigation launched more than one year after a crime. Certainly, groping and fondling are allegations that can be difficult to prove. Unlike more severe sexual assaults, there is rarely certifiable evidence left behind, such as DNA. It becomes the job of police to substantiate claims through witnesses and questioning. And while this may prove difficult, to close the door on justice for anyone over the age of 18 who has fallen victim to a crime or takes longer than the state deems appropriate to report the incident seems absurd.

With this bill before the legislature, lawmakers in Annapolis have an opportunity to truly change the lives of countless sexual assault victims. To take that opportunity away from adults would ignore the trauma such crimes can cause and demonstrate a disturbing lack of understanding. Trauma does not necessarily lessen with age, nor does an individual's right to justice.

Child brides

2011-03-28T06:38:00.000-07:00

http://www.vancouversun.com/life/Bountiful+implicated+human+smuggling+scheme+send+child+brides+United+States/4513704/story.html

Bountiful men implicated in human smuggling scheme to send child brides to United States
Thirty-one Canadian girls aged 12 to 17 are alleged to have been victims of the scheme involving marriages to older men in Texas
By Daphne Bramham, Vancouver Sun March 28, 2011 •Story•Photos ( 2 )
More Images » Warren Jeffs, head of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, is at the centre of a probe in Canada and the United States of cross-border smuggling of child brides.Photograph by: Jud Burkett, AP, Vancouver SunThe RCMP is trying to verify a list of 31 girls aged 12 to 17, who over a 10-year period are alleged to have been transported by their fathers and brothers between Canada and the United States for religious marriages to older men.

If the list is verified and charges laid, it would be one of Canada's largest cases of crossborder smuggling of humans.

The list is based on documents seized by Texas authorities in a 2008 raid on the Yearning for Zion Ranch in search of girls sexually exploited by male members of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.

It's a who's who of North American polygamy including FLDS prophet Warren Jeffs and his most trusted American lieutenants as well as Canada's two most prominent polygamists, James Oler and Winston Blackmore, and their relatives from Bountiful.

The documents, which include church marriage records and Jeffs's diary, have already been used by Texas courts to convict seven FLDS men of child sexrelated charges.

In the diaries, Jeffs detailed how Bountiful men were to sneak their often unsuspecting daughters and sisters into the United States for arranged marriages and how many of the men returned with teenage American brides without any consideration of either country's immigration laws.

That information could well be used against Jeffs when goes to trial later this year charged with two counts of sexual abuse involving two 12-yearold girls and one count of bigamy. Before the trial begins, it's likely Texas will add more charges against Jeffs since the B.C. attorney-general's ministry has already confirmed that a 13-year-old girl and two 12-year-olds from Bountiful became Jeffs's brides after their fathers -Brandon Blackmore, MacRae Blackmore and Spencer Blackmore -delivered them to him in 2004 and 2005.

Those three girls are among nine girls whose birth dates and marriage details were entered as evidence of polygamy's harm in a constitutional reference case to determine whether Canada's polygamy law is valid.

According to documents filed by the B.C. attorney-general, James Oler allegedly delivered his two under-aged sisters to Jeffs in 2004 and, in 2005, minutes after witnessing the marriage of his 15-year-old daughter in Nevada, the 41-year-old Oler collected a 15-year-old bride of his own and took her home to Bountiful.

If the documents are accurate, Oler's actions contrast starkly with an affidavit he filed as part of the reference case.

"[In] instances where members of the community have been suspected of criminal offences ... reports have been made to the police."

Oler, a party to the reference, later withdrew his affidavit.

Since then, Oler has been replaced as bishop by his halfbrother, Kendall Oler, who is also alleged to have married a 16-year-old American girl when he was 41.

Other Olers alleged to have taken child brides between 1996 and 2006 are Ty Rulon and Terrel Ray.

Jeffs's diary notes that Terrel's 16-year-old bride-tobe refused to meet with the prophet before the ceremony "so he [Terrel] needs to pray harder and we will see what the Lord does for them."

Another bride balked at the altar, according to Jeffs's diary.

"She was surprised and has already been leaning toward Winston Blackmore's followers. That is a dangerous wedding to perform when they are not faithful."

Blackmore was the bishop until his excommunication in 2002. But before that -in 1998 and 2000 -he's listed as having taken his two under-aged daughters to their weddings in the United States and in 1999 as the husband of a 16-year-old following a ceremony in Utah.

Blackmore has admitted to having taken "several" young girls as brides and when he was charged in 2008 with one count of polygamy along with James Oler -charges which were subsequently stayed -an RCMP affidavit stated that four of Blackmore's brides were 15, two were 16 and three were 17.

The documents show that, in addition to Blackmore, his older brothers, MacRae and Brandon, and MacRae's son, Spencer, other Bountiful men alleged to have married child brides and brought them back to Canada are Brandon's sons, Brandon Seth and Zane Blackmore, and Justin Andrew Palmer.

But Jeffs's cold-blooded manipulation of people like chess pawns apparently doesn't stop at girls and young women.

His diary alleges that on Christmas Day 2003, he ordered a follower to steal a baby boy from his mother and take him to Jeffs "out of reach of the government and of his mother until his mother can prove that she can maintain the sweet spirit."

Jeffs ends the diary entry: "If she turns traitor and goes and tells anyone ... the Lord will handle her."

Read more: http://www.vancouversun.com/life/Bountiful+implicated+human+smuggling+scheme+send+child+brides+United+States/4513704/story.html#ixzz1Htw13Vie

Priest accused

2011-03-28T06:27:00.000-07:00

http://www.catholiccourier.com/news/local-news/diocese-receives-e28098crediblee28099-abuse-allegation-against-rev-vincent-panepinto/

Diocese receives ‘credible’ abuse allegation against Rev. Vincent Panepinto
The Diocese of Rochester announced Sunday, March 27, that it has investigated and deemed “credible” an allegation of sexual abuse of a minor dating back to the late 1960s against the Rev. Vincent Panepinto.

Rev. Panepinto, who served most recently as sacramental minister of St. Frances Xavier Cabrini Parish in Rochester, has been placed on administrative leave, and his priestly faculties have been withdrawn. He can no longer exercise public ministry in any capacity.

Rev. Panepinto was ordained a priest on June 3, 1967. He served at the former St. Philip Neri Church in Rochester; St. Anthony in Elmira; St. Michael in Rochester; as a chaplain at several state correctional facilities and at Our Lady of Mercy High School; and as spiritual director at Becket Hall discernment house. Prior to his most recent assignment, he was pastor of the former City East parishes in Rochester (Corpus Christi, Holy Redeemer, Our Lady of Mt. Carmel).

The diocese included with its announcement a reminder that victims of abuse always are encouraged to report to the civil authorities. To report a case of possible sexual abuse and to receive help and guidance from the Diocese of Rochester, victims are encouraged to contact Barbara Pedeville, the diocesan victims’ assistance coordinator, at 585-328-3228, ext. 1215 (toll-free 1-800-388- 7177, ext. 1215), or by e-mail to pedeville@dor.org

Read more: http://www.catholiccourier.com/news/local-news/diocese-receives-e28098crediblee28099-abuse-allegation-against-rev-vincent-panepinto/#ixzz1HttEVpEE

Millstone

2011-03-28T06:07:00.000-07:00

http://jp2m.blogspot.com/2011/03/faces-of-rapists-priests-from-father.html
John Paul II Millstone
St. Michael the Archangel tied an 8ftX3ft millstone to the neck of John Paul II in North America at the July 2002 WYD World Youth Day -- because JP2 refused to stop his papal army, JP2PRPA John Paul II Pedophiles Rapists-Priests Army. 9/11 & WTC attacks-5,000 victims- by19 Muslims- led by Osama bin Laden, USA Priest Pedophilia-12,000 victims-by 6,000 rapists-priests- led by John Paul II... JP2PRPA was JP2’s Achilles Heel so St. Michael threw him into the depths of Hell - see post Aug 1, 2006

About Me
Name: Paris Arrow Location: East Coast, United States
Danish cartoonist (of Mohammed) drew this image of John Paul II with inscription "I am against homosexuality but for pedophilia". Read the vision of Paris Arrow on how Saint Michael the Archangel tied the giant millstone on John Paul II's neck at his last WYD in 2002 -- in the John Paul II Millstone post August 1, 2006. John Paul II's neck broke and Saint Michael threw him into a raging sea of fire... The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for (enough) good men - and good women - to do (and say) nothing. Youths of today, do not be deceived by the pathological lies of the Pope and the Vatican. The Vatican own the Swiss Banks where all moneys from corrupt regimes are hidden and poor peoples and poor countries are therefore perpetually oppressed....

View my complete profile

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Sunday, March 27, 2011
Faces of Rapists-Priests: from Father Marcial Maciel covered-up by John Paul II and the Eucharist. JOIN Signatories` protest against JP2 beatification

Written on the Feast of the Annunciation, March 25 … but where,oh,where is the Angel of the Annunciation during the millions of reincarnations of Christ in the Eucharist? Are sinful rapists-priests and their cohorts e.g. Cardinal Bernard Law more powerful than Mary, the holiest creature of them all?

The worldwide appearances of John Paul II during his 27 years papacy with his papal blessings, his thousands of speeches and writings, with the WYD World Youth Day chanting of “JP2 we love you” and “Santo Subito” at John Paul II’s funeral in Rome -- never protected children then and therefore cannot protect children now. John Paul II is the same yesterday and today and forever JP2 is heartless and powerless to safeguard children from predator rapists-priests. Praying to a false god and FALSE SAINT John Paul II cannot protect children from crimes on this earth in this life (or from eternal damnation in Hell in the after-life). Venerating John Paul II’s coffin or blood vial and JP2 statues, medals and relics or reading his thousands of writings cannot protect children – because in his lifetime as Pope John Paul II for 27 years he (wilfully) never protected children from rapists-priests and therefore in death he cannot protect children (or anyone) either. The biggest evidences of this are how he covered-up and promoted the serial rapist-priest Father Marcial Maciel and Cardinal Bernard Law of Boston who confessed to aiding and abetting 80 rapists-priests in Boston.

The Eucharist enshrouds and harbours rapists-priests and the Eucharist never (ever) protects children. That daily Mass of 9-seconds magical transubstantiation and chimerical re-incarnation of Christ’s flesh never did and never can and never will protect children (and women). History has proven that the Sacrament of the Eucharist within holy Catholic churches never sheltered or protected altar boys but rather aided and abetted the Priestly Sodomy of Biblical Proportions committed by the John Paul II Pedophiles Rapists-Priests Army. The Eucharist is the charm and holy guise of predator priests and the Eucharist lures and entraps children (and women) to be easy preys of the lust of these rapists-priests, an all-male hierarchy inherently evil (like the Nazis) who were born out of the Devil’s bowels. The Theology of the Body doctrine of John Paul II (celebrated every year with a worldwide conference) does not mention at all the “theology of the body of children” and how to protect them from theology experts predator priests. The Eucharist and the Theology of the Body and especially a false “saint” John Paul II are all of no use for the safety of children then and now.

The Eucharist was the sceptre of John Paul II to justify the existence of his beloved companion to Guadalupe, Father Marcial Maciel, and the protection of all rapists-priests and he ruled that “priests are forever” and must not be laicized under his 27 years regime as John Paul II the Great. To John Paul II, Eucharistic priests are the highest and noblest of men regardless of their past crimes as exemplified par excellence by Father Marcial Maciel and women and children are subordinates and mere silent followers to priests. Priests are now required by the Vatican to recite blindly John Paul II’s writings to be considered as “All Things Catholic” but how can they force children to blindly pray to John Paul II because it is proven by history and history does not lie: that John Paul II never protected children during his lifetime as a 27 years Pope and therefore he cannot protect children now after his death. So Benedict XVI will fool and ensnare children to pray to a “Saint John Paul II” by hastily beatifying and canonizing him with all the spectacle of a Hollywood movie production at the Vatican. John Paul II’s beatification is really Benedict XVI abusing his papal totalitarian power since he is the last standing “absolute supreme monarch” as the Arab countries topple down their despot kings and dictators, oh when will Catholics ever learn?) Benedict XVI’s supreme powers include condemning people to Hell for all eternity (just like Hitler condemned Jews to the gas chambers) hence there is now a lawsuit against him at the Hague for his “crimes against humanity”. Read our related article below with the list of recent signatories from around the world protesting Benedict XVI’s speedy beatification of John Paul II.

The holiest and most prestigious rapist-priest was Father Marcial Maciel who was personally covered-up and promoted to the holiest offices at the Vatican by John Paul II himself during his 27 years papacy -- that’s quarter of a century of personal cover-up by the holiest of men - John Paul II. Father Maciel was the founder of the Legion of Christ and was called as the "Holy Father" by thousands of followers. Father Marcial Maciel was the apple of John Paul II's eye because he was very obedient, very conservative and brought in 35 billions dollars to the Vatican Swiss Banks (all trillions of dollars are tucked away safe in the mountains of the Alps at the Vatican owned Swiss Banks. His Legion of Christ was the fastest religious congregation in the world with priests ordained annually outnumbering all others (the Opus Dei trailing in as second). All Legion priests are ordained only in Rome (just like the Opus Dei). All Legion priests wear the traditional black robe, they say their Mass in Latin (like the Opus Dei), all are strictly educated in Rome (like the Opus Dei), and most of all they are 'slaves' of John Paul II and the Vatican (like the Opus Dei). The Legion’s “center of the universe” is John Paul II (like the Opus Dei) as most evident in Zenit.org, the Legion's daily only-about-the-Pope online news at the Vatican.

The Eucharist and their absolute obedience to Pope John Paul II are what separate all priests from all Catholics and people in the world, hence the hasty need for the beatification and canonization of John Paul II so that all priests worldwide will simply parrot out his writings in their Sunday homilies…but what a perpetual deception. John Paul II was the empty clashing cymbal of St. Paul, a mere pope preacher and world traveler who never performed acts of charity like Mother Teresa of Calcutta. Bill (and Melinda) Gates has performed more charitable acts than John Paul II who never dirtied his hands and rarely visited the sick and the poor because he only lived as the majestic pope in the gilded Vatican Palace in Rome and walked only in red carpets in his world travels. Instead JP2 used the poor peoples as mere political photo props for his state visits and then he silenced all Liberation Theology theologians especially Jon Sobrino who spoke out against his JP2 papal hypocrisy during his papal travels - read an excerpt here http://jp2m.blogspot.com/2006/11/john-paul-ii-shirked-el-salvador.html

Read the vision of Paris Arrow at the last WYD World Youth Day of John Paul II in 2002 as St. Michael tied the largest millstone around his neck because he refused to stop his John Paul II Pedophiles Rapists-Priests Army http://jp2m.blogspot.com/2006/08/john-paul-ii-pope-of-sodomy.html

August 2004 image of John Paul II in his last voyage to Lourdes. Clad in majestic papal robes, JP2 was an Emperor with no clothes and with no conscience for the plight of thousands of little boys and girls raped by his John Paul II Pedophiles Rapists-Priests Army

To the writers and followers of Totus Tuus Marie of John Paul II:
We compose this blog today, feast of the Annunciation of Mary. If Mary is the purest of all creatures and she needed an Archangel to make her conceive Jesus the Son of God -- and then carry him full term for 9 months -- how can Christ cheapen himself and be reincarnated in the Eucharist by sinful men like Father Marcial Maciel, Cardinal Bernard Law and Cardinal Mahony of Los Angeles and all rapists priests, 6,000 in the USA alone, plus thousands more across Europe and around the world? See the images of an embryo in a woman's womb in our sister blog Mary versus John Paul II : Magisterium Benedict VERSUS Holy Mary: Priests' transubstantiation instant reincarnation of Christ VERSUS Mary’s 9 months pregnancy& child birth http://stella0maris.blogspot.com/2010/01/magisterium-benedict-versus-holy-mary.html

Father Marcial Maciel was the beloved companion of John Paul II in his many papal voyages especially to Guadalupe in Mexico. This special companionship proved that John Paul II smelled the Devil's Bowels as if they were roses - read our related article: The Nazis and of Hitler and the John Paul II Pedophiles Rapists-Priests Army were both an inherently evil all-male hierarchy born out of the Devil's bowels http://jp2army.blogspot.com/2011/01/nazis-and-john-paul-ii-pedophiles.html. John Paul II slept in peace as the most powerful pope for 27 years knowing that Father Marcial Maciel was one of his most notorious rapists-priests in his JP2 Army and for the record, as pope he did nothing to chastise Father Maciel except through the Sacraments of Confession and the Eucharist. That is why the sacraments are tools of injustice. The Sacrament of Penance mocks our justice system and priests demean our court judges. The confessional booth is the very antithesis of our court houses because priests pardon and let sinners or criminals go scot-free without redress for their victims, priests pardon murderers and rapists again and again while their victims are not redressed and their crimes are not reported to the police and these criminals are not tried in our courts of law and jailed for the safety of society. That is why up to this date there is no Catholic Registry of Pedophiles Rapists-Priests because priests are above the law just like the Pope is above the law. But Benedict XVI’s days are numbered as charges have been laid against him at the International Court of Law at the Hague for his “crimes against humanity” http://pope-ratz.blogspot.com/2011/02/criminal-charges-against-dr-joseph.html

To John Paul II, Father Marcial Maciel and all Catholic priests are the highest and noblest of all men because they alone can transform the host into the flesh of Christ. Therefore all priests are above all human laws because priests are supernatural men reincarnating the supernatural Christ the son of God -- and John Paul II is next to Christ as the most powerful supernatural man and he too is above all human laws. The myth of the Eucharist and the magical powers of the priests are what differentiate priests from other secular pedophiles and laymen rapists. Pedophiles rapists-priests continue to be free to roam and go on raping boys and girls. Rapists-Priests are protected by the pathological lies of the infallibility of the Pope and the sorcery of the Eucharist. Children and their parents are afraid to speak and bring to secular courts and jail these rapists-priests because they have god-like powers of reincarnating Christ’s flesh. That is why Benedict XVI is in a hurry to beatify John Paul II the Great so that his face would be venerated in ALL Catholic churches and Catholic Tabernacles where there is the Eucharist. If he is not called a Blessed or Saint, then John Paul II would be a mere pope with thousands of writings about All Things Catholic.

John Paul II’s moral conscience was never bothered by his intimacy with Father Marcial Maciel (as evident in this photo below taken November 2004, only 4 months before his death in April 2, 2005) and the presences of rapists-priests everywhere which were always before him as he traveled around the world as the most travelled pope in history. His narcissistic self-glory as John Paul II the Great numbed his moral conscience and prevented him to unravel the evil stench of Priestly Sodomy of Biblical Proportions following him everywhere he went in the Vatican and in the world. Instead he meditated passively before the image of Our Lady of Guadalupe at the Vatican and everywhere he went because he carried this image wherever he prayed. Ironically, the Guadalupe miraculous image of Maciel's Mexico was John Paul II's favorite and is also revered by the Opus Dei and it was the last image St. Josemaria saw when he had his heart attack -- read it here Opus Dei Pope John Paul II insult Our Lady of Guadalupe causes St. Josemaria Escriva's heart attack http://jp2m.blogspot.com/2008/07/opus-dei-pope-john-paul-ii-insult-our.html. The Legion of Christ basilica in Rome is named after Our Lady of Guadalupe and Father Marcial Maciel had planned he would be buried at the main altar just like the coffin is under the main altar of the Opus Dei basilica in Rome.

The Legion of Christ basilica in Rome was named after Our Lady of Guadalupe because it is considered to be the most miraculous and it originated in Mexico, Father Marcial Maciel’s country of origin. Father Maciel had planned he would be buried at the main altar just like the coffin is under the main altar of the Opus Dei basilica in Rome. But shortly after Father Maciel's death, more revelations came out from Mexico that he had fathered several children. Two of them revealed that he repeatedly raped them, their own biological father a holy priest and a holy founder of thousands of holy priests. So to hurry up John Paul II's beatification, Pope Benedict XVI has instructed that all photos of Fr. Maciel with John Paul II must be removed from all Legion of Christ houses. Criminal investigations, including investigations at the Vatican, are being carried out to dig out the complete criminal past Father Marcial Maciel.

Father Marcial Maciel being blessed by John Paul II November 2004 at the Vatican - 4 months before John Paul II died on April 2, 2005...History does not lie.

This real photograph of Father Marcial Maciel being blessed by John Paul II proves that the fantasy and sorcery of the Eucharist is the foremost tool of crimes because it enshrouds criminals with the odor of godliness and therefore can never (ever) protect children and women in our society. There is no “real presence of Chirst” in the Eucharist or He would be the very tool of evil crimes in the hands of rapists-priests. The Eucharist is the sorcery of feel-good fanstasy like Harry Potter magic.

Benedict XVI's haste (abuse of his papal power) to beatify John Paul II has been met with God-sent road blocks again and again. But of course the Pope is a supernatural infallible man—the ultimate despot on the planet earth. Nonetheless God's hands seem to strike at every turn Benedict XVI makes (and we pray for God to strike his hand and mouth to stop the beatification of John Paul II on May 1, 2011 at the Vatican… if there is realy a true God in the 21st Century). When Benedict announced that he had approved John Paul II's miracle, the John Paul II Pedophiles Rapists-Priests Army erupted in Ireland. When the Vatican announced a second miracle of John Paul II on his German barber in Rome, the JP2PRAPA erupted in Germany. Read our related articles below.

Fr. Marcial Maciel, the poster boy of all the tens of thousands of victims of John Paul II Pedophiles Rapists-Priests Army, has come back to haunt and disprove the "heroic virtue" John Paul II. There was nothing heroic or virtues in the life of John Paul II who, as recorded in history, was a coward pope who never dared speak up against the most heinous crime against children in the 20th century, the Priestly Sodomy of Biblical Proportions committed by his John Paul II Pedophiles Rapists-Priests Army. He spoke against the communism in Poland while he sat in glory at far away Vatican and travelled by pope-mobile – no it wasn’t John Paul II who liberated Poland from communism but the people of Poland who dared march in the streets of Poland and get them shot. Another pope to be beatified, Pope Pius XII was afraid to speak against the Nazis and as an excuse it was for fear of his life, but John Paul II was a narcissistic coward who refused to speak against rapists-priests -- for fear of losing his title as John Paul II the Great -- and for fear of losing the chants of WYD World Youth Day youths chanting “JP2 we love you”…but at last St. Michael tied a giant millstone around JP2’s neck and dragged him until his papal neck broke and then cast him into a raging sea of fire …as seen in the vision of Paris Arrow at JP2’s last WYD in Toronto in July 2002 (artists are welcome to depict it and donate proceeds to Jon Sobrino in el Salvador ) read it here John Paul II the Pope of Sodomy: Vision of St. Michael the Archangel tying a giant millstone to John Paul II at World Youth Day in 2002 http://jp2m.blogspot.com/2006/08/john-paul-ii-pope-of-sodomy.html

Read Benedict XVI angers Jewish groups for declaring “Venerable” Pius XII who did nothing during Holocaust… like John Paul II did nothing for clergy abuse http://pope-ratz.blogspot.com/2009/12/benedict-xvi-angers-jewish-groups-for.html

Compare the CRIMES and their VICTIMS in America

Victims - Attackers - Responsible Leaders

Pearl Harbor - 3,000 victims - 170 planes - Admiral Yamamoto

WTC & 9/11 attacks - 5,000 victims - 19 Muslims - Osama bin Laden

USA Priest Pedophilia - 12,000 victims - 6,000 priests - John Paul II & Benedict XVI & Opus Dei, the new Vatican Trinity

Opus Dei controlled the 27 years papacy of John Paul II and is therefore the foremost guilty party who aided and abetted and covered-up the John Paul II Pedophiles Rapists-Priests Army. Opus Dei wrote most of John Paul II’s books and writings and to ensure their perpetuity as “All things Catholic”, they want JP2 to be beatified and canonized now by Benedict XVI so as not to take any chances on other future popes. The FACE of Opus Dei is John Paul II and the PHANTOM Spirit of Opus Dei is their founder St. Josemaria Escriva. John Paul II followed the Spirituality of St. Josemaria Escriva (so does Benedict XVI). Opus Dei is the most secretive cult of the Catholic Church and they now control the Vatican bank and the Vatican Swiss Banks. There is a strict hierarchy in Opus Dei: the Pope and St. Josemaria on top, second are Opus Dei appointed Cardinals and Bishops, Opus Dei priests, Opus Dei numeraries (celibates like religious brothers and nuns) lay men and lay women and children are subordinates, non-Opus Dei laity are the lowest rank and mere blind followers to Opus Dei. That is why women can never become priests, NEVER in the Opus Dei Vatican all-male hierarchy. Opus Dei is the most violent of all groups because they physically harm their critics and enemies. They are the ones who ordered that Jon Sobrino be silenced.

Read our related articles

Holy Heist! John Paul II WYD had no role with Arab youths who liberated Egypt from Mubarak who stole then deposited billions into Vatican Swiss Banks http://society-culture.segnalafeed.com/john-paul-ii-millstone-holy-heist-john-paul-ii-wyd-had-no-role/

Saint? John Paul II slept in peace at the Vatican knowing that Fr. Marcial Maciel plus thousands of pedophile priests were raping thousands of boys http://jp2m.blogspot.com/2011/02/saint-john-paul-ii-slept-in-peace-at.html

Mexico mounts a worldwide campaign against the beatification of John Paul II, they should for they are the people of Our Lady of Guadalupe http://jp2m.blogspot.com/2011/01/mexico-mounts-worldwide-campaign.html

Beloved companions John Paul II and Fr. Marcial Maciel together in their journeys to Guadalupe: Both were great founders and great deceivers alike http://jp2m.blogspot.com/2011/01/beloved-companions-john-paul-ii-and-fr.html

Canon Law and John Paul II, the Vatican & Benedict XVI never saved children nor excommunicated pedophile priests during last quarter of 20th Century http://www.blogger.com/post-edit.g?blogID=31954140&postID=2704275348461502442

Theology and John Paul II are heartless and together they made the immoral Fr. Marcial Maciel thrive http://jp2m.blogspot.com/2010/05/theology-and-john-paul-ii-are-heartless.html

More charges

2011-03-27T10:49:00.001-07:00

http://www.sundaymercury.net/news/midlands-news/2011/03/27/birmingham-paedophile-priest-accused-by-three-new-victims-66331-28409313/
Birmingham paedophile priest accused by three new victims
Mar 27 2011 by Jeanette Oldham, Sunday Mercury

123next
THREE new victims claim they were abused by a pervert priest who was allowed to flee to America by the Catholic Church.

And the Sunday Mercury can today reveal how Father James Robinson, 73, was helped to leave the country when allegations were first made against him in the 1980s.

Church officials played down alleged abuse to US counterparts to facilitate his move abroad – describing the first victim’s claim that the priest had repeatedly raped him as “an unfortunate relationship”.

Anna Wheeler, a senior prosecutor with West Midlands Crown Prosecution Service’s Complex Casework Unit, finally extradited Robinson back to Britain to face justice.

The pervert was jailed for 21 years at Birmingham Crown Court last October after being found guilty of multiple sex offences against six boys as young as 10.

Ms Wheeler revealed two new victims had come forward before the trial and another afterwards. There will be no further prosecution, although their evidence is “entirely believable”.

She said: “One of two new victims who came forward just before the trial had previously sued the Church over his abuse. He didn’t wish to be involved in the court case.

“The other person was unable mentally to cope with the idea of court proceedings.’’

Ms Wheeler added that one other person had come forward to claim they had been abused by Robinson after he was jailed.

She said: ‘‘They have now been advised by the police that the public interest will not be served by prosecuting Robinson again, because of the length of sentence he received.

“He’s serving 21 years; he’s really not likely to come out.”

Robinson moved from parish to parish in Coventry and Birmingham between 1959 and 1983.

His congregation viewed him as a “charismatic, charming, forceful personality” – but behind the scenes he was grooming youngsters by taking them out in his sports car.

Robinson continued to work as a priest after moving to California in 1985, at a time when the Most Reverend Maurice Couve de Murville was the Archbishop of Birmingham.

Ms Wheeler has seen Church documents which show church leaders KNEW he had been accused of raping a young boy when he fled to the US.

“When he went to America there was certainly some disclosure to the American Catholic Church that there had been an allegation, an ‘unfortunate allegation that they didn’t think was really going to go anywhere’”, said Ms Wheeler.

“I think that that came to haunt them a little bit later – because that first victim didn’t go away.