TOLEDO (OH)
WNWO

TOLEDO -- A local priest accused of inappropriately touching another man has posted bond Wednesday morning.

Father Frank Murd is charged with one misdemeanor count of sexual impostion.

This stems from an incident in the hot tub at the Jewish Community Center in Sylvania in March.

MCKINNEY (TX)
LifeSite

By Michael Baggot

MCKINNEY, TX, May 14, 2008 (LifeSiteNews.com) - Yesterday evening, Fr. Mallinson resigned from his new position as pastor after the Dallas Diocese received numerous complaints about his involvement in a prominent, pornographic online network for actively homosexual priests and religious.

As LifeSiteNews.com reported yesterday, Dallas Bishop Kevin Farrell appointed Fr. Mallinson the pastor of the newly constructed St. Michael's Parish in McKinney, Texas, despite the priest's previous connection with the infamous St. Sebastian's Angels (SSA) website.

As his own diocese confirmed, Fr. Mallinson's picture appeared on the now-defunct SSA site, which included lewd comments, pornographic images, and insults against Pope John Paul II and then-Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger.

DALLAS (TX)
EDGE Boston

by Kilian Melloy
EDGE Contributor
Wednesday May 14, 2008

A Dallas-area priest who had contributed to an Internet site where gay priests electronically congregated has resigned amidst protests regarding his involvement with the site.

The Dallas Morning News reported in a May 14 article that Arthur Mallinson, a Catholic priest assigned to McKinney’s St. Michael the Archangel Church, resigned in order to keep the controversy around his involvement with the site from getting out of hand and harming the congregation.

According to diocese communications director Annette Gonzales Taylor, Mallinson felt his resignation "was in the best interest of the parish, his family and the diocese," reported the Dallas Morning News article. ...

An undated Washington Times article that has circulated on the Internet detailed how the site for gay priests generated concern and was eventually restricted to a password-protected private site.

However, Catholic laypersons afraid that active gay priests might be a danger to their children managed to gain access to the site, and copied the priests’ chat messages to another, public site, for concerned Catholics and others to view.

ITALY
Corriere Della Sera

COMO - Una brutta storia. Il vescovo emerito di Como Alessandro Maggiolini è stato iscritto sul registro degli indagati della Procura di Como per il reato di favoreggiamento personale di don Mauro Stefanoni, l'ex parroco di Laglio (Como) attualmente a processo per violenza sessuale.

[translation]

Requested 8 years of jail for the former parish priest of Laglio

Como: the former bishop Maggiolini is being investigated

The charge consists of leaking secret information to the Rev. Stefanoni, accused of sexual violence

COMO - An ugly story. The name of the retired bishop of Como Alessandro Maggiolini is now in the registry of the persons to be investigated by the Como prosecutor: the crime is leaking secret information to the Rev. Mauro Stefanoni, the former parish priest of Laglio (Como), who is being tried for sexual violence.

THE CHARGE - According to the allegations, Maggiolini in November 2004 summoned to the Curia the Rev. Stefanoni to inform him he was the subject of an ongoing penal investigation for sexual abuses. Nobody knows about the exact period in which the bishop's name was put in that registry, which was given as a collateral information during the ongoing trial of the Rev. Stefanoni. Just on Monday the prosecutor Ms. Vittoria Isella asked the judge to sentence the priest to 8 years in jail.

The priest is accused of sexual violence of a former parishioner, a minor when the alleged abuse occurred and affected by a slight mental retardation, who denounced him in 2004. The accused always proclaimed his innocence, but according to the reconstruction of the facts made in the courtroom by the prosecutor "the homo-pornographic vdeo cassette which was found in the rectory, the typology of the movies he bought, the websites and the chat lines frequented, the nicknames he used to do that, the relationship he maintained with a former parishioner of Ponte Stresa, all constitute a perfect frame of the picture depicted by the victim". Today there will be a new hearing dedicated to the defendant's lawyers speeches.

May 13, 2008

UNITED STATES
National Catholic Reporter

By MARY GAIL FRAWLEY-O'DEA
Publication date: May 16, 2008

Mary Gail Frawley-O’Dea proposes the following steps as a path toward reconciliation in the sex abuse crisis:

Steps for the bishops

Since these things start at the top, Catholic bishops could take a number of concrete steps:

* Lead legislative efforts in every state to do away with criminal statutes of limitation for sexual abuse of a minor.

* Lead legislative efforts in every state to clarify mandated reporting laws, expanding them to include clergy if they do not already. Urge legislators to put teeth into these laws by assessing substantive penalties on mandated reporters who fail to report abuse to civil authorities.

UNITED STATES
National Catholic Reporter

By MARY GAIL FRAWLEY-O'DEA
Publication date: May 16, 2008

Dispassionate discourse about the sexual abuse of children is an oxymoron. The subject touches our most primitive passions and fears, rendering rational thought and balanced reflection difficult to sustain. Pope Benedict XVI’s mid-April visit to the United States set in relief these discursive challenges. Reactions to him tended to devolve into defensive “either/or” dichotomies -- either his visit was a tremendously transformational moment in the scandal or he continued to miss the boat in hurtful ways. In fact, his trip provided a “both/and” moment in the crisis still tearing at the church.

Benedict spoke about the tragedy and evil of sexual abuse five times in a variety of venues. First, he expressed deep shame over the sexual abuse of young people by priests. He also seemed finally to acknowledge that homosexuality and pedophilia are distinctive entities, making it more difficult for commentators to reconstruct sexual abuse by priests as a homosexual phenomenon.

In speaking to reporters on his flight from Rome, the pope said, “I do not wish to talk at this moment about homosexuality, but about pedophilia, which is another thing.” The pope continued, “We will absolutely exclude pedophiles from the sacred ministry.”

DETROIT (MI)
Voice from the Desert

Gregg Krupa / The Detroit News
DETROIT — The Archdiocese of Detroit will ordain five men to the priesthood Saturday, a sacred, joyous event for Catholics who are concerned about the dwindling number of men who hear “the call” to what is, by any estimation, a difficult life.

But outside of the Cathedral of the Most Blessed Sacrament on Woodward, a group of Catholic men and women, organized by Call to Action of Michigan, intend to demonstrate in favor of the ordination of women and married men, asserting that while they fully support the five new priests, the church must be far more inclusive.

UNITED STATES
Voice of the Faithful, National Survivor Support Working Group

The Survivor Support Working Group of Voice of the Faithful agrees with Ms. Teresa Kettelkamp's recent statement on the current sexual abuse crisis that "the church is not yet where it needs to be in addressing this crisis."

It is important to note that Ms. Kettelkamp is an employee of the Executive Director of the Office of Child & Youth Protection (OCYP) which comes under the oversight of Austin Bishop Gregory M. Aymond, Chairman of the Bishops' Protection of Children and Young People' Committee. On child sexual abuse: Does the pope really get it? Yes By Teresa Kettelkamp, Published in the LA Archdiocesan weekly newspaper The-Tidings.

While we applaud the efforts of Ms. Kettelkamp and her office, we must point out that despite her assertion that the pope gets "it," (note that "it" remains conveniently undefined), we challenge the bishops to "get it," too.

In truth:
--- Bishops have failed to restore trust in their leadership and in the words of the Pope "badly handled" the sexual abuse crisis. It should be noted that an April 14th Washington Post ABC poll showed that 73% of Catholics opposed the way the church was handling the sex abuse scandal.

--- Members of the National Review Board have no authority. They are merely an advisory group.

--- Victims' assistance and safe environment coordinator positions are typically filled with diocesan employees answerable only to the bishop. There is a little or no independence with regard to executing their duties.

ITALY
la Repubblica

COMO - Sul registro degli indagati della procura di Como è stato iscritto il nome di Alessandro Maggiolini, vescovo emerito della città lariana, con l'accusa di reato di favoreggiamento personale nei confronti di don Mauro Stefanoni, ex parroco di Laglio, attualmente a processo per violenza sessuale. Secondo l'ipotesi accusatoria, Maggiolini il 16 novembre del 2004 avrebbe convocato in Curia don Stefanoni per riferirgli dell'indagine penale a suo carico.

[translation]

Pedophilia, the former bishop of Como investigated for leaking information to the accused

COMO - The name of Alessandro Maggiolini, retired bishop of Como, has now been added to the registry of those being investigated by the Como prosecutor for allegedly leaking information to the Rev. Mauro Stefanoni, the former parish priest of Laglio, who is being tried for sexual violence. According to the charges, in November 2004 Bishop Maggiolini allegedly summoned the Rev. Stefanoni to the Curia telling him secret information about the ongoing penal investigation to which the priest was being subjected.

Just yesterday, at the end of a four hour speech, the prosecutor Ms. Vittoria Isella requested the priest be sentenced to 8 years in jail. The inclusion of the retired bishop's name in the registry of those to be investigated - which hasn't yet be confirmed by the prosecutor - came as a collateral action in the trial of the Rev. Stefanoni.

The priest is accused of sexual violence against a minor-aged former parishioner, affected by slight mental retardation, who accused him first in front of his schoolmates and his family and afterward to the judiciary authority.

Stefanoni always declared his innocence, but according to what the prosecutor said in the courtroom "the porno-homosex video found in the rectory, the content of the satellite TV movies which he bought, the internet sites he visited, the chats he frequented, the utilized nicknames and his relationship with a former parishioner from Ponte Tresa, represent a perfect frame for the painting depicted by the victim".

The news about the bishop's name in the registry emerged during the accusatory speech made by the Como vice prosecutor Ms. Maria Vittoria Isella. The magistrate made a recap of the entire story, affirming the investigation started substantially with a limp, for during the preliminary investigation the accused priest had been informed of it and therefore some leads couldn't be followed through. The fact the leaks came from the bishop emerged from the police investigation, from the wiretaps and by the same former parish priest of Laglio, who admitted in the courtroom to have been summoned at the Curia and warned by bishop Maggiolini he was being investigated.

In the afternoon the Rev. Mauro's lawyers, Bomparola and Martinelli, affirmed "the charges against our client are the fruit of a machination which started from the deviance and mental fantasies of the boy" and pointing out the necessity of his being subjected to a legal medical scrutiny.

The Como Curia always defended the priest who was investigated and the same bishop Maggiolini, issuing a statement which criticized the press for having reported the story: " We can't understand - it said - why there is this insistence in charging a priest who hasn't yet been found guilty and that we wish he will never be. A citizen is to be considered innocent until a definitive sentence has been issued". Bishop Maggiolini also explained why he hadn't until then taken an official stance: "The Curia didn't say anything because it's better to be silent than gossiping when facts aren't clear yet". He underlined at the end that "simple and moderate people are looking to the Rev. Mauro in the hope to see him fully reintegrated in his sacerdotal ministry. The rest is gossip and often malevolent. I pray for the Rev. Mauro. I'm near him with affection".

That opinion was much criticized: not only the Rev. Mauro was never suspended while ascertaining his position, but, after a period of house arrest and his auto suspension for "health reasons", he was transferred to Colico (Lecco) as an assistant in contact with children.

(May 13, 2008)

UTAH
Deseret News

By Ben Winslow
Deseret News
Published: Tuesday, May 13, 2008 4:34 p.m. MDT

The former child bride whose testimony led to the conviction of Fundamentalist LDS Church leader Warren Jeffs is telling her story in a new book.

Elissa Wall's much anticipated autobiography, "Stolen Innocence," hit bookstore shelves on Tuesday, at a time when interest in the FLDS is at a national high because of the raid in Texas. The book was published by William Morrow, a division of HarperCollins.

Wall devotes most of the 431-page book to her upbringing in the FLDS Church and her marriage that led to the criminal charges being filed against Jeffs, spending the last third devoted to the high-profile trial and her views of it from the witness stand.

EL PASO (TX)
KFOX

[with video and link to indictment of Father Taban on sexual assault charges]

Monica Balderrama-KFOX News Reporter

EL PASO, Texas -- The trial of Catholic priest Philip Taban, who's accused of sexually assaulting an 18-year-old woman, continued on its second day on Tuesday morning.

Taban was arrested in September 2007 on charges of sexual assault against an 18-year-old woman. The jury heard from the alleged victim who testified that a friend of hers introduced them at a cook-out. The next day she went to Taban's residence to talk because she needed spiritual guidance but it led to something else, she testified.

"He was touching me on my breast, then he told me he wanted to put his hand underneath my pants. I said no," said the alleged rape victim who will not be identified.

The woman testified she didn't quite understand what was happening. She said she felt uncomfortable and confused.

TEXAS
WFAA

[with video]

12:51 AM CDT on Wednesday, May 14, 2008

By STEVE STOLER / WFAA-TV

MCKINNEY - A priest in the Diocese of Dallas has resigned from his parish just two weeks after taking the pulpit, and it stems from questions that have arisen about his sexuality.

The Diocese of Dallas said Father Arthur Mallison has done nothing that violates church policy, but e-mails have circulated about a picture of the priest that appeared on a website set up as a support site for homosexual clergy. The site is called St. Sebastian's Angels and was created in 1999.

"There was a faction in the parish that had started a nationwide campaign to put pressure on Father," said Annette Gonzales-Taylor, a Diocese of Dallas spokesperson.

UNITED KINGDOM
The Northern Echo

By Tony Kearney
CHILD abuse by a perverted priest was ignored by church authorities for decades, even though several of his victims spoke out.

Retired priest Father John Corrigan was jailed for four years yesterday for the abuse of three altar boys and a girl in the sacristy and vestry of his Gateshead church dating back 40 years.

The 72-year-old, who also worked in parishes in Seaham and Newcastle, admitted nine

NORTHERN IRELAND
Belfast Telegraph

Tuesday, May 13, 2008

A Catholic priest has been jailed for four years by a court in Newcastle for a string of sex attacks on children.

72-year-old Father John Benedict Corrigan had been extradited from Ireland to England to face charges for the attacks, the earliest of which occurred over 40 years ago.

Corrigan, known as Father Ben, had retired to Ireland in the early 1990s, and was brought back to England from Westport in Co Mayo to face trail for the attacks on the children at the church in Gateshead, Tyne and Wear.

ALASKA
Kodiak Daily Mirror

Article published on Tuesday, May 13th, 2008
By RALPH GIBBS
Mirror Writer
Now that Bishop Nikolai Soraich has left Alaska, many Orthodox Alaska Diocese members are wondering how the rift between the bishop’s supporters and detractors will be healed, especially in light of some recent comments by Bishop Nikolai’s aide Archimandrite Isadore.

Early last week, Bishop Benjamin and Archpriest Alexander Garklavs visited Alaska to answer that question. The two Orthodox Church in America clerics traveled to Anchorage to consecrate the new St. Tikon church, and took the opportunity afterwards to travel to Kodiak to meet with clerics and parishioners.

Bishop Benjamin tried to start the healing process once Bishop Nikolai agreed to step down by posting a letter to OCA members on the Alaska Diocese Web site.

BOSTON (MA)
WBUR

[with audio]

By Monica Brady-Myerov

BOSTON, Mass. - May 12, 2008 - It's been almost a month since Pope Benedict XVI visited the United States. The most memorable moment of his tour came when the Pope met with alleged victims of abuse by priests in Massachusetts.

That unannounced meeting and Benedict's comments on clergy abuse have raised hopes in the survivor community that the Vatican would change how it handles the issue. WBUR's Monica Brady-Myerov reports.

TEXT OF STORY:

MONICA BRADY-MYEROV: The Boston Archdiocese handpicked five abuse victims to speak one on one with the Pope in a chapel with bishops and security guards nearby.

The first was Bernie McDaid from Peabody.

BERNIE McDAID: I said Holy Father I gotta to talk to you.

BRADY-MYEROV: Pope Benedict nodded and held both of his hands. McDaid told him that when he was an 11-year-old alter boy in Salem, he was sexually abused by Father Joseph Birmingham in the sacristy, the room off the altar.

CANADA
Northern News Service

Yumimi Pang
Northern News Services
Published Monday, May 12, 2008
Nunavut/NWT - A former NWT premier and aboriginal rights advocate is urging the developing Truth and Reconciliation Commission to meet with Northerners face to face.

Nellie Cournoyea, CEO of the Inuvialuit regional corporation, said she would like to see the commission travel to Inuvik.

"I would encourage them to come to the northern part of the region so that people can have easy access to it. Inuvik should be a community that would be chosen. We've been involved right from the beginning and we have put a lot of time, effort, and people power behind it. It was a difficult task to get the determination of which schools would be considered (residential schools)," said Cournoyea.

She said the chance to speak out and be heard would help survivors with the healing process.

CANADA
CBC News

While tens of thousands of Canadians have received compensation for the time they spent in Indian residential schools, one former student in the Northwest Territories says he is still trying to qualify for the payments.

Albert Nitsiza of Whati, N.W.T., said he has been trying for more than a year to have Chief Jimmy Bruneau School added to Ottawa's list of residential schools that qualify under the compensation agreement.

Only those who attended any of the 132 recognized schools on the federal list can qualify for the lump-sum compensation known as common experience payments. Fifteen of those schools are in the Northwest Territories, including Akaitcho Hall in Yellowknife, Lapointe Hall in Fort Simpson and Grollier Hall in Inuvik.

CANADA
CBC News

The federal government has named the two final members of the Indian Residential Schools Truth and Reconciliation Commission, which is to begin its work June 1.

Indian Affairs Minister Chuck Strahl announced Tuesday that Jane Brewin Morley and Claudette Dumont-Smith are to sit on the commission that will hear personal stories from survivors of Canada's residential school system.

In April, Justice Harry LaForme was named the chairman of the three-member panel that was part of the government's out-of-court settlement with former students of the government- and church-run schools.

The aim of the five-year commission is to give a voice to those who suffered through the schools' systemic abuses and allow them to take steps toward healing.

TEXAS
KWTX

[with video]

(May 13, 2008)--Behind guarded, ornate gates at the end of a rural road, a self-proclaimed prophet warns his followers about the end of time and rails against a dangerous and unclean world outside their West Texas compound in Clyde, but this isn't the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints' ranch, which authorities raided last month in Eldorado after receiving reports that underage girls were being forced to marry much older men.

This is the House of Yahweh: a different, even darker sect that the state has been investigating for years.

It’s between Clyde and Eula In Callahan County.

In February, authorities charged the group's 73-year-old leader with performing polygamous weddings and forcing about 40 children, some as young as 11, to work jobs at his 44-acre compound.

If convicted on the most serious charges, Yisrayl Hawkins would face as much as 20 years in prison.

CANADA
CNW Group

OTTAWA, May 13 /CNW Telbec/ - The Honourable Chuck Strahl, Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development and Federal Interlocutor for Métis and Non-Status Indians today announced the final two appointments for the Indian Residential Schools Truth and Reconciliation Commission (IRSTRC).

Jane Brewin Morley and Claudette Dumont-Smith are being appointed as Commissioners, and together with the Chair of the Commission, Justice Harry LaForme, they will begin their work on June 1, 2008. Justice Harry LaForme was appointed as Chair of the Commission in April 2008.

"I am honoured to appoint these two highly respected women who have both served in many esteemed professional and public positions. Their extensive experience and considerable knowledge will be invaluable," said Minister Strahl. "Soon these highly respected Commissioners will begin their work, and former students who had been victimized by Residential Schools will have the opportunity to come forward and ensure their stories are heard and recorded in history."

AUSTRALIA
Catholic World News

Canberra, May. 13, 2008 (CWNews.com) - The Australian Catholic bishops' conference has issued a public statement warning of "doctrinal difficulties" in a book by the retired bishop.

Bishop Geoffrey Robinson, who was an auxiliary bishop of the Sydney archdiocese for 20 years prior to his retirement in 2001, is the author of Confronting Power and Sex in the Catholic Church: Reclaiming the Spirit of Jesus. Bishop Robinson is currently on a promotional tour, speaking about the book to audiences in the United States.

At their May meeting, the Australian bishops warn that Confronting Power calls into question "the authority of the Catholic Church to teach the truth definitively." The book reflects "Bishop Robinson’s uncertainty about the knowledge and authority of Christ himself," the bishops report.

DALLAS (TX)
CatholicCitizens.org

5/6/2008 10:28:00 AM
By Barbara Kralis

My Dallas Bishop, Kevin Farrell, has appointed a new pastor for the beautiful large parish in McKinney, TX named St. Michael's Catholic Church. St. Michael's parishioners, and they number thousands of families, recently completed construction of a beautiful Traditional looking gothic church.

St. Michael's is still a Novus Ordo parish. It is only 30 miles South of our Ranch.

At one time, we did attend this parish for many years in the past. However, we could never consider attending it now. Let me explain why St. Michael's is now a huge problem.

The new pastor, appointed this month by the Dallas bishop, is one of 'The Boys' photographed on the well-known [now closed down] sodomite priest website called 'St. Sebastian's Angels.'

DALLAS (TX)
The Dallas Morning News

12:07 AM CDT on Wednesday, May 14, 2008
By SAM HODGES / The Dallas Morning News
samhodges@dallasnews.com

A longtime priest of the Catholic Diocese of Dallas resigned Tuesday from his new post at St. Michael the Archangel Church in McKinney amid complaints about his past participation with an Internet site for gay priests.

The Rev. Arthur Mallinson "felt [resigning] was in the best interest of the parish, his family and the diocese," said Annette Gonzales Taylor, communications director for the diocese.

Father Mallinson had begun work at the McKinney church only a couple of weeks ago, having been transferred by the diocese from St. Francis of Assisi Parish in Lancaster, where he had served for years.

But Father Mallinson's move prompted a widely circulated Internet item relating his history with the Web site and questioning whether he would drive families from the McKinney parish.

CANADA
Metro

May 13, 2008 04:13
OTTAWA - Two women have been named to help lead hearings into abuse at native residential schools, as a truth commission starts June 1.

Jane Brewin Morley, a lawyer, and Claudette Dumont-Smith, a native health expert, will work alongside Canada's most senior aboriginal judge.

Harry LaForme was named head commissioner last month of the five-year, $60-million forum to hear from former students.

It's part of a massive compensation package that's expected to reach $4 billion in settlements and healing programs.

TEXAS
KLBJ

5/13/2008

Newsroom

Austin Police say the interpreter for the Texas School for the Deaf, arrested Friday for alleged sexual misconduct with a student, has admitted to many more similar crimes. Detective Greg White, of Austin's Child Abuse Investigations unit, says Shane Fluornoy, 32, claimed a teenage victim was trying to bilk money out of him.

"He protrayed it like the juvenile here, the 15-year-old male, was extorting him for money," White said Tuesday. ...

In Houston, police say the First Baptist Church and the Black Deaf Association of Houston are two places where Fluornoy met some of his victims.

UTAH
Conde Nast Portfolio

by Claire Hoffman June 2008 Issue
Even before the showdown in Texas, Bruce Wisan was trying to save the Mormon polygamists from their power-mad leader. But they believe Wisan was sent by the devil, which is making the job infernally hard.

On the outskirts of Las Vegas, ­Warren Jeffs, the prophet and leader of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, the polygamist sect of Mormonism known as the F.L.D.S., barreled down Interstate 15 in a red Cadillac Escalade. Driving him was Isaac Jeffs, one of his dozen or so brothers. Naomi Jeffs—a beautiful 32-year-old blond with hair to her knees who was both Warren’s former stepmother and the wife he reportedly called 91—rode in back. They carried $57,000 in cash in the lining of a suitcase, 16 cell phones, 12 pairs of sunglasses, four laptops, three wigs, a fistful of keys to other luxury vehicles, and a cache of handwritten letters addressed to “the Prophet.” ...

Wisan is neither a prophet nor a polygamist, but he holds an important position in the sect. In a sense, he has been hired by the state of Utah to replace Jeffs as the head of his community. Wisan has been put in charge of the United Effort Plan, the legal trust that the polygamists started by pooling their resources and creating a communal society 66 years ago. The U.E.P. owns about 85 percent of the land in this enclave and most of what sits on it. Worth an estimated $110 million, the trust holds all the assets—hundreds of homes, a few farms and factories, thousands of acres of land, a church, a zoo, several schoolhouses—accumulated by the labor, frugal living, and generous tithing of generations of these isolated believers. So conservative was their spending that, before Wisan, the trust never even had a checkbook.

AUSTRALIA
Catholic News Agency

Sydney, May 14, 2008 / 04:05 am (CNA).- The Australian Catholic Bishops Conference has issued a statement responding to a controversial retired bishop for his new book that doubts Catholic teachings.

In 2007 Bishop Geoffrey Robinson, retired Auxiliary Bishop of the Archdiocese of Sydney, published a book titled “Confronting Power and Sex in the Catholic Church: Reclaiming the Spirit of Jesus.” According to The Age, Bishop Robinson argued in his book that the Church’s refuses to examine Catholic teachings on extramarital sex, women priests, homosexuality, and papal power this means the Church is not serious about responding to clerical sexual abuse but is only “managing” it.

The 71-year-old Bishop Robinson headed the Australian church’s efforts to address sexual abuse for a decade. The bishop, who says he was a victim of abuse as a child, retired in 2004 because he was reportedly disillusioned by his work.

FARMINGTON (ME)
Sun Journal

By Ann Bryant , Staff Writer
Wednesday, May 14, 2008
FARMINGTON - A Wilton man was sentenced Monday to six months in jail for sexual abuse of a teenage boy 14 years ago.

Justice Michaela Murphy sentenced William E. Donald, 59, to three years with all but six months suspended. He will serve the time at the Franklin County jail. ...

Donald's pastor, Kathleen Dunford, said that in the past seven years she had found Donald to be kind, compassionate and sincere. She told the court that she has had sexual abuse training through the church and hadn't seen anything inappropriate in Donald's behavior.

AUSTIN (TX)
MyFox Austin

Austin Police revealed Tuesday that 32-year-old Shane Flournoy, who is accused of paying a TSD student to expose himself, had inappropriate sexual contact with at least five boys in the late 1990’s and early 2000’s. Police say the boys were between the ages of 13 and 16-years-old and the abuse took place in the Houston and Harris County area.

Investigators say he admitted to the abuse during questioning. Flournoy moved to Austin in May of 2007 and was hired at the Texas School for the Deaf as a dorm worker. He was also a youth minister at the Solid Rock Baptist Church.

According to court documents, he paid one of his 15-year-old students $200 to expose himself and then inappropriately touched the boy. Police also say he let the boy surf for porn on his computer at home.

NEOSHO (MO)
The Joplin Globe

By Jeff Lehr
jlehr@joplinglobe.com

NEOSHO, Mo. — A probe of alleged child sexual abuse, focused on a Newton County pastor, widened Tuesday with the filing of 10 more charges against him, including three felony counts based on allegations of a fourth young woman.

The Newton County prosecutor’s office filed five more counts of second-degree statutory sodomy, two counts of first-degree statutory sodomy, two counts of first-degree child molestation and a misdemeanor charge of second-degree child molestation against Randall “Danny” Russell, the 49-year-old pastor of the Acts II Church near Neosho.

Russell already was facing single counts of second-degree statutory rape, second-degree statutory sodomy and child abuse related to a woman who came forward in late April with allegations that Russell began molesting her and taking nude photographs of her in 2003, when she was 16.

NASHVILLE (TN)
NewsChannel 5

NASHVILLE, Tenn. - A few former members of a church said they were sexually abused as children and the church did nothing to stop it.

"The man that raped and abused me was the brother of the minister of this church," said Crystal Mears.

"He sexually abused me," said Cheryl Mears Morrell. "He digitally raped me."

"I told my mother and I told my pastor and nobody did anything," said Jennifer Meier-Beita.

NEW JERSEY
The Star-Ledger

by Ralph Ortega/The Star-Ledger Tuesday May 13, 2008, 12:26 PM
For the second time, a former Milford priest has been convicted of abusing a child.

A jury deliberated less than three hours before finding John M. Banko guilty today of sexually abusing a young boy between September 1994 and January 1995.

Banko, 62, is already serving 15 years on a 2006 conviction for abusing an altar boy after Sunday Mass twice in the 1990s. At that time, the Roman Catholic priest was pastor at St. Edward's the Confessor in Milford.

The latest conviction could add 20 years to his prison sentence.

YAKIMA (WA)
Yakima Herald-Republic

by Jane Gargas
Yakima Herald-Republic

A national advocacy group for victims of clergy sexual abuse is challenging the Catholic Diocese of Yakima to do more to find if there are other victims.
But the diocese stands behind its efforts.

"I believe we're doing a good job," the Rev. Robert Siler, diocesan chief of staff, said Tuesday.

The victim advocacy group, Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, recently sent a letter to Bishop Carlos Sevilla, urging him to do more investigations and outreach.

TUCSON (AZ)
Arizona Daily Star

[with statement from Bishop Gerald F. Kicanas]

By Kim Smith
Arizona Daily Star
Tucson, Arizona | Published: 05.14.2008

A former Tucson priest admitted Tuesday afternoon to engaging in sexual acts with three teenage boys in 1983 and 1984.

The Rev. Gary E. Underwood pleaded guilty to six counts of sexual conduct with a minor and will be sentenced in August.

Underwood is facing a mandatory prison sentence of between nine months and two years on one of the counts. Pima County Superior Court Judge Richard Nichols must decide if Underwood should receive lifetime probation or identical prison sentences on the other counts, or a combination.

VERMONT
Rutland Herald

By KEVIN O'CONNOR Herald Staff

BURLINGTON — A jury ruled Tuesday that Vermont's Catholic Church should pay a record $8.7 million for negligence in hiring and supervising a pedophile priest.

A 12-person panel deliberated for almost five hours before finding the statewide Roman Catholic Diocese liable for charges in a Chittenden Superior Court lawsuit regarding the former Rev. Edward Paquette, who worked in Rutland in 1972, Montpelier in 1974 and Burlington in 1976. ...

The verdict — met with stunned silence — is almost nine times the previous record of $965,000 paid by the diocese two years ago to settle the first and so far only other lawsuit involving Paquette to reach trial.

The ruling's ramifications could potentially bankrupt the state's largest religious denomination. Having spent six years and more than $1.57 million to resolve at least eight past lawsuits, it still must tackle 24 more involving nine past priests. Of those pending cases, 17 involve Paquette. ...

The church is almost certain to appeal the verdict, its lawyers said. The diocese doesn't have insurance for priest misconduct, although it says it held a comprehensive liability policy from 1972 to 1978. But the church can't find its copy of the policy and its insurer argues it isn't liable for cases in which the holder is found negligent.

VERMONT
Burlington Free Press

By Sam Hemingway • Free Press Staff Writer • May 14, 2008

A Burlington jury issued a landmark verdict against the state’s Roman Catholic diocese Tuesday, ordering it to pay $8.7 million in damages to a former Burlington altar boy fondled multiple times by a priest the church knew was a child molester.

“They have sent a message,” attorney Jerome O’Neill, who represented the former altar boy, said moments after the verdict was announced. “The jury saw the evidence and made a fair decision with respect to it.”

A grim Bishop Salvatore Matano, who attended the six-day trial, said in a brief, separate interview that the size of the verdict could pose serious problems for the diocese. He called the looming predicament a “sad and tragic moment in our history.”

“I have to look very seriously at what this verdict means as it impacts on our services and the activities of the diocese,” Matano said. “I have to be very conscious that the verdict as it stands will have a very serious impact on a rural diocese; a small, rural diocese.”

Matano also signaled that the diocese might look for a way to settle the remaining clergy abuse cases rather than risk another costly trial and jury verdict.

INDIA
Hindustan Times

Ramesh Babu, Hindustan Times

Thiruvananthapuram, May 14, 2008

A sexual assault complaint by a teenage girl led to the arrest of controversial godman Swami Amritha Chaitanya on Tuesday.

As it turned out, the 35-year-old swami was wanted by the Interpol and Dubai police for fraud.

The swami, whose real name is Santhosh Madhavan, has been running a plush ashram at Vyppin, Kochi, for the past five years.

Kochi Police Commissioner Manoj Abraham said, "The girl filed a complaint saying the swami had sexually assaulted her a number of times. He was arrested immediately."

EL PASO (TX)
KVIA

EL PASO, Texas - The trial for Catholic Priest Philip Taban, who is accused of second degree sexual assault, continued Tuesday at the 409th District Court. ...

After the testimony both sides rested their cases. Closing arguments are scheduled for Wednesday.

VERMONT
Boston Globe

May 13, 2008
BURLINGTON, Vt.—A jury awarded $8.7 million in damages Tuesday to a former altar boy who sued the Roman Catholic Diocese of Burlington over sexual abuse he says he suffered at the hands of a priest.

The man, now a 40-year-old mechanical engineer in Lakewood, Colo., sued the diocese over molestation he claims he suffered at the hands of parish priest Rev. Edward Paquette in the 1970s. His suit claimed negligent supervision by the diocese, accusing church officials of hiring Paquette despite warnings about allegations of molestation of boys in previous assignments. ...

Bishop Salvatore Matano told reporters at the courthouse: "The verdict is a very serious impact on a rural diocese, a small, rural diocese, and I do not want in any way to inflict any suffering or any pain on the faithful of this diocese because of what happened in the past."

"The evidence was compelling," said Jerome F. O'Neill, the lead attorney representing the man. "Our client went through what no child should ever have to go through, and he did so because the diocese paid no attention to the perpetrator it was putting in its parishes."

ITALY
Catholic World News

Rome, May. 13, 2008 (CWNews.com) - Bishop Alessandro Maggiolini, the retired head of Italy's Como diocese, will be charged as an accomplice in a sex-abuse case, according to Italian media reports.

VERMONT
NECN

[with video]

(Anya Huneke, NECN: Burlington, VT) - The jury spent about four hours pouring over the details of the case, trying to decide whether Vermont’s Roman Catholic Diocese should be held accountable in the molestation of an altar boy in the 1970s.

Jurors found the Diocese guilty of negligence in its hiring and supervision of former priest Edward Paquette.

According to the evidence, the Diocese had been warned that Paquette had a history of molestation in Indiana and Massachusetts. Also known according to evidence, was that the Diocese knew Paquette continued to fondle boys in Vermont, including at Christ the King in Burlington, where the plaintiff, now 40, was an altar boy. He claims he was molested 40-100 times by Paquette over two years.

UNITED STATES
Fairness & Accuracy in Reporting

5/13/08

UPDATE--The Catholic League, a conservative Catholic advocacy organization, has challenged the accuracy of FAIR's April 29 media advisory, "Pope Gets Pass on Church Abuse History." In a May 2 release, "Media Watchdog, FAIR, Smears Pope," League president Bill Donohue challenged FAIR's report that before he was elected pope, Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger “sent a letter to church bishops invoking a 1962 doctrine threatening automatic excommunication for any Catholic official who discussed abuse cases outside the church’s legal system.”

According to Donohue, “The document did not apply to sexual misconduct--it applied only to sexual solicitation that might take place in the confessional." Donohue went on to say that because "the policy was specifically aimed at protecting the secrecy of the confessional, it called for an ecclesiastical response: Civil authorities were not to be notified because it involved a sacrament of the Catholic Church, not a crime of the state."

Donohue, who accused FAIR of failing to read the document, is in error. "Crimen Sollicitationis," the 1962 Vatican document in question, explicitly includes acts taking place outside, as well as inside, the confessional. Under the headline "On the Worst Crime" (Chapter V, article 73), the scope of the document is extended to include "any obscene, external act, gravely sinful, perpetrated in any way by a cleric or attempted by him with youths of either sex or with brute animals."

The issue of whether "Crimen" applied to acts committed outside the confessional was addressed by Monsignor Brian Ferme, a doctor of canon law, in "Il Proceso Penale Canonico," a book published by Lateran University Press, a publishing house affiliated with the Vatican. As Monsignor Ferme explained, "While the instruction dealt specifically with solicitation and the procedural norms to be applied in judging this crime, the fifth chapter stated that the same norms were also to be observed for the 'crimen pessimum' (article 71), which was understood to include paedophilia (article 73)."

by The Republican Newsroom Tuesday May 13, 2008, 4:02 PM
From staff and wire reports

VERMONT
the Republican

BURLINGTON, Vt. - A jury has awarded $8.7 million in damages to a former altar boy who sued the Roman Catholic Diocese of Burlington over sexual abuse he says he suffered at the hands of a priest.

The man, now a 40-year-old mechanical engineer in Lakewood, Colo., sued the Diocese over molestation he claims he suffered at the hands of parish priest Rev. Edward Paquette in the 1970s. His suit claimed negligent supervision by the Diocese, accusing church officials of hiring Paquette despite warnings about allegations of molestation of boys in previous assignments.

After about four hours of deliberations, the Chittenden County Superior Court jury returned a verdict calling today for $950,000 in compensatory damages and $7.75 million in punitive damages.

VERMONT
Burlington Free Press

May 13, 2008

A jury has awarded a former altar boy more than $8 million in damages against the Roman Catholic Diocese of Burlington in a historic verdict today in Chittenden County Superior Court.

After more than five hours of deliberations, the panel of eight men and four women returned at 3 p.m. with a verdict of $950,000 in compensatory damages and $7.75 million in punitive damages.

The plaintiff, a 40-year-old Colorado man who claimed he was abused 30 years ago by the Rev. Edward Paquette while serving at Christ The King Church in Burlington, had asked for between $6 million and $12 million.

AUSTRALIA
The Age

Barney Zwartz
May 14, 2008

AUSTRALIA'S Catholic bishops have disowned retired Sydney bishop Geoffrey Robinson, accusing him of failing to understand fundamental church teachings.

The country's bishops have released a public statement suggesting that Bishop Robinson — as a bishop, a man chosen by the Pope to guard the teaching of Catholics — is wrong about the authority of Christ and the authority of the church to "teach the truth".

The statement was the first official response to Bishop Robinson's controversial book published last August, in which he said the church needed to reverse 2000 years of teaching on sex and power as part of radical reforms from the Pope down.

In Confronting Power and Sex in the Catholic Church, Bishop Robinson suggested that while the church refused to examine some fundamental teachings — including sex outside marriage, women priests, homosexuality and papal power — it was not serious about tackling abuse by priests, only "managing" it.

VERMONT
Burlington Free Press

By Sam Hemingway • Free Press Staff Writer • May 13, 2008

A judge denied this morning the plaintiff's request to declare a mistrial in a civil trial against the Roman Catholic Diocese of Burlington, instead turning the case over to the jury.

Jury deliberations will get under away after Judge Matthew Katz presents last-minute instructions to the panel. Lawyers for a former altar boy who says he was repeatedly fondled by a priest in the 1970s asked the jury Monday to consider punitive damages of up to $12 million.

This morning, Jerome O'Neill requested Katz to declare a mistrial in the case, saying a closing argument made by an attorney for the diocese was inflammatory and "a hate speech."

"What was said about (the plaintiff) and his lawyers ... was an appeal to prejudice," O'Neill said today. "It was like a hate speech, inflammatory and highly prejudicial in many respects."

Monday, Thomas McCormick, representing the diocese, told the jury in the Chittenden County Superior Court trial that the damages requested by the plaintiff were exorbitant. “This isn’t a state where lawsuits turn into lotteries. You represent the community. You know that’s an absurdity.”

UNITED KINGDOM
Shields Gazette

Published Date:
13 May 2008
By Karon Kelly
A FORMER Catholic priest who carried out a five-year campaign of child abuse was today jailed for four years.

Father John Corrigan sexually abused three altar boys and a girl at his church in Gateshead during the late 1960s and early 1970s.

His female victim told of her ordeal when it happened, and one of the others spent the early 1980s trying to convince the authorities what had happened to him.

But it was only 40 years later, when Corrigan admitted what he had done,
that his victims have finally received justice.

UNITED STATES
National Catholic Register

BY MARK SHEA

May 18-24, 2008 Issue | Posted 5/13/08 at 10:41 AM

The “scandal” of the Gospel used to be a badge of honor for Catholics.

It was “scandalous” that God should become man, die on the cross, and grant us life through death. All of these affronts to the world’s wisdom were summarized by St. Paul:

“For since, in the wisdom of God, the world did not know God through wisdom, it pleased God through the folly of what we preach to save those who believe. For Jews demand signs and Greeks seek wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and folly to Gentiles, but to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. For the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men” (1 Corinthians 1:21-25).

“Scandal” comes from skandalon (stumbling block). Some things about the Gospel are supposed to be “scandalous” in that good, Pauline sense of the word.

But not sin. Not the sexual abuse of children. Not the shame of pastors who shuffled around abusers rather than protecting their victims. That sort of skandalon is not a stumbling stone, but a millstone that Jesus hated and solemnly warned against. It has been one of the many painful realities of the Long Lent of 2002 that the Pauline meaning of the “scandal of the Gospel” has been buried under the disgraceful scandal caused by those to whom the Gospel had been especially entrusted.

VERMONT
Boston Globe

May 13, 2008
BURLINGTON, Vt.—A jury has reached a verdict in a priest sex trial involving the Roman Catholic Diocese of Burlington.

There's no word, yet, however, on what the verdict is.

A 40-year-old former Burlington altar boy says the Diocese is partly to blame for molestation he suffered at the hands of a parish priest at Christ the King Church in the 1970s.

The man's attorney say church officials should be slapped with a multimillion dollar damage award for hiring Father Edward Paquette in spite of knowledge that he'd been accused of molesting children in other states.

CHICAGO (IL)
Chicago Tribune

By Azam Ahmed | Tribune reporter
12:59 PM CDT, May 13, 2008

A former Jesuit priest accused of molesting two brothers in Arizona will not be extradited from Cook County until he faces similar charges in federal court here, a Cook County Circuit Court judge ruled Tuesday.

At his extradition hearing, Donald McGuire—who was defrocked earlier this year—was told that although Arizona Gov. Janet Napolitano has signed a warrant for the former priest's arrest, he will remain in custody here until pending federal charges in Illinois are dealt with.

McGuire, 77, had been scheduled to appear last month for his extradition hearing, but complained of chest pains and was rushed to Mercy Hospital. On Tuesday, he received the Arizona warrant in a wheelchair before being taken back into custody.

TEXAS
PRNewswire

SAN ANTONIO, Texas, May 13 /PRNewswire/ -- Attorneys for a married couple who lived in the fundamentalist Mormon community in Eldorado, TX, will ask a Bexar County District Court judge today for an emergency order to prevent the state from taking away their infant child, who is still nursing, when he turns a year old on Thursday.

Attorneys are filing a petition with the presiding judge at 3:30 p.m. seeking an emergency injunction to keep the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services from removing Joseph Steed Jessop Jr. from the care of his mother, Lori Jessop, 25. The petition also demands that Lori and her husband, Joseph Steed Jessop Sr., 27, be told the whereabouts of their other two children, and that the court schedule a hearing to determine whether the state can legally continue to hold the children.

According to the petition, a social worker told Mrs. Jessop that the child would be removed from her care when he turned a year old. All three children are being held without the authority of any court order, according to attorneys.

ITALY
Tendenze

Roma, 9 mag. (Apcom) - Colpevole di atti sessuali su minore. Per questa accusa un sacerdote di 49 anni, E.M., è stato condannato all'esito del rito abbreviato, a 4 anni di reclusione, dal gup del tribunale di Roma, Marina Finiti. La sentenza è stata pronunciata nei giorni scorsi, ma la notizia si è appresa solo oggi. Secondo l'accusa il prete avrebbe compiuto abusi sessuali su due bambine di 10 anni anche durante la confessione. A carico dell'imputato il pm Francesco Scavo aveva contestato l'articolo 609 quater del codice penale.

[translation]

Rome, May 9 (Apcom) - Responsible of committing sexual acts on a minor. That was the charge to a 49-year-old priest, E.M., sentenced to 4 years in jail at the end an abbreviated procedure by the judge of the Rome Tribunal, Ms. Marina Finiti.

The ruling was issued days ago but the news was made public only today. According to the charge the priest had sexually abused two ten-years-old girls, even during confession. The Prosecutor Francesco Scavo had charged the priest according to article 609 quater of the penal code.

According to the accusation, E.M., " using his position of spiritual father of those girls who attended the course of catechism at the parish of Santa Rosa of Viterbo and thus profiting from such an authority, repeatedly and in various circumstances (also in the occasion of confession), after having brought them to the sacristy and to his private apartment inside the parish, caressing their body on many occasions and embracing them around their neck, hugging them and kissing their face and their mouth using his tongue".

According to the accusations, the abuses happened in the parish situated in the Tor di Quinto zone, in the north of the Capital, between 2005 and 2006.

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